: 




,0 o 



^ * h 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER; 



OR, 



THIRTY-SIX DAYS IN THE 3 WOODS. 



GIVING THE PERSONAL EXPERIENCE OF PRISON LIFE IN GORDONS- 
VILLE, LYNCHBURG, DANVILLE, MACON, SAVANNAH, CHAR- 
LESTON, AND COLUMBIA, TOGETHER WITH A DESCRLEV 
TION OF HOW NEW CAPTURES ARE RECEIVED INTO 
PRISON, OF HOW THEY ACT AND WHAT THEY 
DO, ETC., ETC., AND TWO ESCAPES, THE 
LAST SUCCESSFUL, FROM COLUMBIA 
TO KNOXVILLE, OVER 
A DISTANCE OF 



EXTENDING THROUGH THIRTY-SIX DAYS, AND FRAUGHT WITH 
MANY THRILLING ADVENTURES AND HAIR- 
BREADTH ESCAPES. 



CONTAINING NONE BUT ENTIRELY NEW ITEMS. 



FOUR HUNDRED MILES, 



BY AN INDIANA SOLDIER. 




INDIANAPOLIS : 
J. M. & F. J. MEIKEL & CO., PRINTERS, 



1868. 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year of our Lord 18G8, 
BY THE AUTHOR, 

In the Clerk's office of the United States District Court, for the District of Indiana. 



PREFACE. 



In presenting this little volume to the public, the author claim - 
for it nothing in a literary point of view. It has not been pre- 
pared for the library or the critic's desk, nor has it grown out of any 
desire for literary fame; but it is the legitimate offspring of the 
" embarrassing leisure " generally attendant upon the beginning of 
a profession. Its publication, however, is not so much to find em„ 
ployment, as to preserve in some kind of order for the satisfaction 
of ourself and friends, the adventures, hardships, and sufferings en- 
dured in an escape from Columbia, S. C, to Knoxville, occupying 
thirty-six days. .This, then, being our principal object, we have 
thought proper to sketch very briefly, in a simple manner, but a 
few of the leading features of seven months confinement in rebel 
prisons, and if in our endeavors to tell the truth, we have exagger- 
ated or obscured any material fact, to that extent have we fallen 
short of our aim. In some things mentioned we may not corro- 
borate other writers upon the subject, for we have written in a 
spirit of liberality towards the jailors of the South, and with no 
other guide than a few imperfect notes, hence whatever discrepan- 
cies may appear, may no doubt be accounted for in the fact that 
we have labored, especially to evade a too vivid recollection of our 
treatment, to the end that we might deal impartial justice to cur 
enemies, as well as to the generous and loyal hearts that aided us 
in our final accomplishment. So much has already been written 
upon " the treatment of prisoners of war," that we feel considerable 
hesitaation in adding anything more, and our silence in many mat- 
ters we desire to be construed into a desire to save the reader from 
wearisome repetition. To detail all the crimes and barbarian cruel- 
ties that came under our personal observation, in the various prisons^ 



2 



would take more time and more pages than we have leisure to 
write, or the public patience to read. To present something new, 
to prepare for the fickleness of old age, to enliven a sympathy for 
the loyalists of the South, and give recreation in an idle hour, more 
especially to the children, is the hope of 

THE AUTHOR. 

Danville, Ind., 1808. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

Jack Pendleton vs. Henderson — Grant's Last Campaign — - 
The First Day's March — General Rice and his Staff — 
The First Guns of the Wilderness — Mistake of the Second 
Brigade — -Lieutenant Mitchell — The Captured Mississip- 
pian — The Fury of Battle — The Climax 

CHAPTER II. 

Parker's Store — Lieutenant Shelton — First Escape— Shel- 
ton's Strategy — The "Wilderness Battlefield and its Dead — 
The Whip-po-wills of the Rapidan — The Grievous Mistake 
—Shelton Gives Out — Takes Refuge at Mrs. B.'s— 
Charley, the Rebel — The Ignominious Betrayal — Off 
for the South — The Thieves at the Rapidan — Sheltou's 
Trouble with his New Clothes — -The North Carolina Lieu- 
tenant — -Shelton's Resolute Pluck— General Wadsworth — 
Shelton Left Behind — All Alone Now — Tim. Hayden — 
General Lee's Head-Quarters — Colonel Richardson — 
Yank — The Poor Indian — Gordonsville and Starvation — 
Charlotsville — Lynchburg — Pandemonium — Relic of the 
Institution — Danville— Jamestown — Bill Reese — Augusta 
■ — Macon — Camp Oglethorpe — How they Took us In — 
Who we Met Inside — The German Captain — Tunneling — 
The Fourth of July 



11 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER IV. 

Lieutenant Chisman — Off from Macon — General Stoneman'e 
Raid — At Savannah — The Curious Populace — Drayton 
Street — Chisman and the Rebel Girl — The Prison — Major 
HiJl and His Guard — How They Treated Us — From Sav- 
annah to Charleston — The loth of September — Charleston 
Jail Yard—The Bombardment — Under Fire of Our Own 
Guns— The Desolation of the City — Yellow Fever in Our 
Camp — -Consternation of Our Guards — Sent to Columbia — 
Intense Suffering from Thirst — The Rebel Refugees — The 
Cadets — - Camp Sorghum — Amusements — Rations — An 
Officer Tom to Pieces by Dogs — The Final Escape 

CHAPTER V. 

Lieutenants Good and Baker — The Home Stretch — The First 
Night's Difficulties — Our Organization — The First Negro 
—Our First Interview — Chisman's Speech to the Darkies 
— The Saluda River — Quandary as to Route — Our Second 
Interview with the Negroes — Our Decision — Streets of 
Laurensville — The Irishman's Short Comings — Good and 
the Gander— Locked Up in a Barn — In Terrorem — Martin 
and Moses — -Sumptuous Supper — The Two Cavalrymen — 
North Carolina Line — Fight Among Ourselves — The 
Hounds at Ross' — Reuben- — Captain Pace and His Com- 
pany After Us — Reuben's Fidelity — Collision with Captain 
Pace — Saluda Gap — The Guard in the Road — Flat Rock 
—Interview with Rebel Soldiers — How We Escaped 
Them — On a Lost Mountain, Lost, Starving and Freezing 
—The Culmination of Sufferings and Trouble — God "Works 
in a Mysterious Way — The Union Girls — The Garret — 
Juan's Strategy 

CHAPTER YI. 

The Women of North Carolina — Waiting for Guides — The 
Candy Pulling — The Old Gossip — More Female Strategy 
—Adieus — Among the Robbers — Their Murders — Their 



CONTENTS. 



Cave — Their Engagement with Us — Why They had to 

Tarry — The Expedition to Dr — The Capture of One 

of the Vances — Our Hurried Departure — Crossing the 
French Broad River — Good and His Pone — Banks Bur- 
ton's — His Neighbors and Family— Among the Mountains 
— The Obstinacy of Our Guides — The Majesty of Mount 
Piscah — Abandoned by Our Guides in the Wild Mountains . 132 

CHAPTER VII. 

South Hominy Creek, Buncombe County, N. — Uncle 
Jimmy Smith — That Day's Fight Between the Unionists 
and Rebels — George Peoples — Kim. Davis- — Our Next 
Guide — Week in Buncombe County — Girls of Buncombe- 
Farewells in the Davis Family — Again in the Mountains — 
Sandy Mush — Rocky Ridge — Mr. Dunn — The Mules- 
Federal Pickets — Knoxville — The Old Flag — How We 
Felt — How We Looked — Gay Street — General Carter — 
In a Federal Hospital — Hood Besieging Nashville — Or- 
ganization for Home, via Cumberland Gap — Kim. Home 
Again — Conclusion , 160 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER ; 

OR, 

THIRTY-SIX DAYS IN THE GAUNTLET. 



CHAPTER I. 

JACK PENDLETON VS. HENDERSON — GRANT'S LAST CAMPAIGN 

THE FIRST DAY'S MARCH — GENERAL RICE AND HIS STAFF 

THE FIRST GUNS OF THE WILDERNESS MISTAKE OF THE 

SECOND BRIGADE LIEUTENANT MITCHELL THE CAPTURED 

MISSISSIPPIAN THE FURY OF THE BATTLE — THE CLIMAX. 

Those who were with the 1st Division, 1st Army Corps, 
at Culpepper, Virginia, in the winter of 1863 and '64, will 
all remember Jack Pendelton, with his dogs, his parrots, 
and his race horses. Jack, without doubt, belonged to 
the F. F. Vs. He not only said so, but his pedigree, 
which he often recited in our company, ran back through 
a collateral family of the Washingtons. He was 67 years 
old, his hair was white and silken, and hung down in; 
massive clusters near a pair of broad, square shoulders, 
surmounting a body of comely proportions. He had been 
raised by, and lived always among slaves, with a whip 
or club in his hand, and his habit of command had grown 
into second nature in his dotage; and it was his egotis- 
tical and dictatorial address that makes him so well re- 
membered by those soldiers who came under his notice. 
Jack was rich before the War; had many broad acres 
about Culpepper, and counted his slaves by scores. But, 

unhappily, he lay in the war path of the Potomac^ and 
2 



2 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



the armies, both Northern and Southern, marched and 
counter-marched over him for two years, so that at the 
time of which we write, perhaps not one rail could be 
found on his one thousand arable acres , and scarcely a 
dozen wagon loads of knotty pine and oak wood. His 
valuable negroes had ran away, their houses were torn 
down, his fine orchard destroyed, his garden and park 
laid waste, and a mile south of the Court House, upon a 
beautiful elevation, nestled among forest trees, in the 
midst of a vast desolated plain stood his sightly residence, 
which had still been spared. This house no doubt had 
been a seat of hospitality : for the long tables, the many 
broken decanters and the numerous horse racks at the 
gate, spoke it louder than the oft' repeated words of the 
host. Jack was an anti-secessionist at the start, but, prob - 
ably, more from policy than principle, for in an able and 
eloquent speech, delivered in Richmond in the winter of 
1860, his principal argument was the inevitable desolation 
of Virginia in the event of a war. He, too, had been a 
politician ; had represented the Whig party of his Dis- 
trict for two terms in Congress and had filled a foreign 
appointment under Taylor. He was the great personal 
friend of Abraham Lincoln ; they had served in Congress 
together, and Mr. Lincoln, with a dozen other members, 
once went home and spent the holidays with him. This 
was the event that supplied Mr. Pendleton with many an- 
ecdotes, which he could tell in capital style. A half mile 
west of the house was the course where he beat Mr. Lin- 
coln in a horse race ; and twelve miles to the east was the 
Wilderness, which now contains more dead men's bones 
than deer, is the place where the party chased a deer for 
two consecutive days — Mr. Lincoln proving himself the 
noblest Nimrod of them all. 

Four rooms in Jack's house — two below and two above, 
were now occupied by General Rice as Headquarters, and 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



3 



the writer of this sketch was doing duty on his staff. Our 
party, eight in all, upon the main, got along agreeably 
with the host, after our reconciliation ; but when we first 
occupied, without permission, the old man suggested? 
rather emphatically, too, that he regarded it a summary 
proceeding, saying, "that when General Longstreet made 
his headquarters there but a few weeks before, he had. 
the politeness to negotiate with him. 

Jack Avas a rebel now, and most vehemently hated run 

away negroes. We had four or live of these at head- 
quarters, who were constantly giving the old man trouble. 
Among them was a great big muscular African named 
Henderson, who had ran away from an old friend near 
Fredricksburg. Jack's hate especially rested upon this 
boy, for no other reason than lie had left him whom he 
knew to be a good master. Henderson was a taciturn, obe- 
dient, inoffensive boy, and went about the premises doing 
errands, saying nothing to anybody, and had several times 
run when pursued by Jack. But he was finally forbidden 
the yard, and informed that if he entered it again, it 
would be upon peril of his life, and for several days went 
trudging around through the mud, while the other ser- 
vants could pass and repass through the yard at pleasure. 
This forbearance ceased to be a virtue with Henderson, 
and he asked the General one day what he had done, or 
who he was that this distinction should prevail among 
them. The General, always on the side of the oppressed, 
told him to go about his business, and through the yard 
whenever his duty required it ; that he must be polite 
and kind to the old man, but if Jack showed him any vio- 
lence, to defend himself. This counsel was oil upon 
troubled water, and Henderson went from the General 
walking an inch taller than ever before, for it was the 
first time in all his life that he had license to fight a 
white man. 



4 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



It was not more than an hour until there was a collis- 
ion. Henderson had but time to get to our kitchen and 
black a few pairs of rusty boots, when he boldly started 
through the yard to deliver them. Jack, ever on the alert, 
met him, raised his cane, and, as usual, with a terrible 
oath, went to the attack, but this time to find battle in- 
stead of chase. Henderson parried, thrust, and down 
went the blooded Virginian to the ground, crying- mur- 
der, and bellowing like a gored ox. Every body about 
headquarters ran out immediately, and what we saw was 
more ludicerous than serious. 

We found Henderson sitting astride the old aristocrat, 
with knees upon his arms, and a lion's grasp upon his 
throat, counseling or shutting off his breath, as the case 
required. 

The parties were summoned to trial — Rice sitting in 
judgment — witnesses sworn, white and black, in antici- 
pation of the Civil Rights bill. The case was regularly 
tried, which resulted in the General giving an elaborate 
opinion adverse to Jack. This threw the old lawyer into 
hysterics ; he raved, he swore, and he cried. Commanded 
the General to leave the house, or burn it with him in it ; 
that he would rather perish in his own house than to be 
so insulted in it. Because Rice would not do either, Jack 
appealed to Corps Headquarters, but General Newton was 
always too much engaged to investigate it. 

J ack went to Washington and Baltimore that winter- 
Notwithstanding his rebel proclivities his relations with 
Mr. Lincoln were sufficient to secure him the necessary 
pass over the signature of the President. His business 
was, ostensibly, to get family supplies. The morning he 
was to leave home he came into the dining room while 
we were at breakfast, with his high hat and scissor- 
tailed coat on, and remarked : 

*Rice, I should expect a pleasant time with my friends 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



5 



if it were not for that G — d Stanton ; he hates me, and 
if he finds I'm up there, he is almost sure to arrest me." 

"Oh no," says R., "he would not think of it when he 
finds out that you are up there on invitation of the Presi- 
dent." 

He was to be gone two weeks, but three had well nigh 
passed before he returned. Mrs. Pendleton, an excellent 
and amiable lady, was much distressed at his absence, and 
to her great relief, one afternoon, Captain Lacock's wagon 
drove up and left at the door an eight gallon demijohn of 
whisky, two barrels of crackers, two or three of flour, 
one of hams, etc. Soon the old man was seen coming 
slowly over the hill, evidently out of humor. He passed 
in through the back door, and was not seen any more 
that day. 

The next morning, while we were at breakfast he came 
in with his brow knitted and wearing the expression of 
a desperate man. 

The General accosted him. " Why ! good morning Mr. 
Pendleton. I'm glad to see you back. You staid longer 
than you expected to, did you not? " 

" Yes. May G — d — that Stanton ; he arrested me, sure 
enough." 

Some how Stanton found out that Jack was in the 
city and arrested him on the way to the cars, return- 
ing home, and detained him in prison a day or two, and 
until the President ordered his release. 

On the night of the 23d of May, 1864, we broke the 
happiest camp ever occupied by the army of the Potomac. 
Man and officer felt as he drew off the little piece of shel- 
ter-tent which had formed the roof of his log hut, "well, 
we've had many a happy time in these quarters, anyhow.' 
And we had, too. We had had excellent rations, good 
clothing, and furloughs, three things as necessary to the 
good feeling of an army as discipline and victory is to its 



6 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



efficiency. Every one, too, seemed to appreciate the mag- 
nitude of the work before us. 

Grant had been made General of the Armies, and com- 
ing from the West, flushed with victory, and flattered in 
his hold on policy, had established himself with us. He 
had concentrated large forces of foot and horse men, and 
to this end had made all the forts and bomb-proofs 
about Washington and Baltimore disgorge. These ex- 
traordinary preparations, together with a very sugges- 
tive order from General Meade, beginning : " Soldiers I 
you are again called upon to meet the enemy;" was 
conclusive enough to the dullest man that aggression was 
the plan of the campaign, and that when the Army of 
the Potomac moved, with its new., leader, its power was 
to be felt and feared. The Army had perfect confidence 
in Grant, and in themselves. Although perhaps not so 
many victories were inscribed upon their banners, they 
never doubted but that they could fight as long and as 
well as the Western Armies, if led by the same genius. 
Nor for once did we believe, that when the much hated 
Eapidan was again crossed, that we would have to return 
as we had done twice before. 

The order for our march was not unexpected, and found 
but few unready, yet it was not without some trouble that 
we made ready to move out — certain transfers of property 
to make, tents to turn in, pack mules to saddle, provisions 
to pack up, etc. But when midnight came we were all 
ready to fling our brigade into line. Our orders took us 
to Germania Ford, and in that direction the 1st A. G-, 
now the 5th, was soon wending its way through and over 
the hills. 

The night march was made without interruption, and 
next morning we made our coffee at Steven sburg, but 
eight miles from the Ford. 

The morning opened up very warm. The road was dry 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



7 



and dusty, and as the sun's rays fell scorchingly upon 
backs burdened with prodigious knapsacks, there fell in, 
on either side of the road, innumerable blankets and over- 
coats. Had some enterprising Quartermaster followed in 
the wake of this Potomac Army for two days he might 
have collected enough of such articles to supply at least 
one half the corps the coming winter. 

About noon we crossed the Rapidan without opposition, 
and just on the other side halted in a pine grove to rest 
and cook some coffee. An hour was there spent, when 
we again moved out on the plank road leading to Fred- 
ricksburg. The march this afternoon was as labored as 
any I ever saw. The men, with the usual large loads car- 
ried on the opening of a campaign, and having had a long 
rest, made it very difficult for them to trudge along 
through the intense heat and dust. Many were overcome 
and fell by the way side, and many more were discour- 
aged and sullen, so that before we reached our bivouac at 
Wilderness Tavern, the straggling was alarming. Our staff 
was ordered out to drive all stragglers to the ranks, and 
for one, I have spent few afternoons when my duties were 
more fatiguing. It was one continuous command of 
"move on!" and forcing up with the sword or revolver 
worn out soldiers, whose very countenance depicted ex- 
treme suffering. But at 5 P. M. the head of the column 
reached the Tavern, and after another hour's ride we suc- 
ceeded in getting the Brigade in camp, and the roll called 
to the satisfaction of the Generals. We then rode off 
with General Rice to a little eminence capped with a clus- 
ter of pine bushes, and here picketed our horses and 
pitched our tents for the night. We were all dirty and 
tire^d, but after taking a good wash and putting on clean 
collars, we sat together upon a grassy mound, feeling 
happy, for our day's work had been satisfactorily done. 
But, for some reason, the General's usual humor and vi- 



8 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



vacity was wanting, and he seemed serious and downcast. 

Lamdin said to him, "General, what's the matter? 
Are you unwell ?" 

"Oh, no ! I'm just tired ; that's all." 

After drinking our coffee he said to us : 

" Boys, all of you fill your pipes and come with me 
again to those bushes. I want to have a talk with you." 

Rice was one of the few christian Generals. His Bi- 
ble and evening prayer were no more neglected than his 
sleep. Though sometimes complained ot for his petulenee, 
he was, for the most part, a meek, kind, exemplary chris- 
tian. Six of us sat down with him. He first asked each 
what his purposes and objects in life were after the war, 
and then proceeded in a lengthy, but excellent moral lec- 
ture. He exorted us to temperance and morality. "But 
beyond all, study honesty and integrity, which are the 
moving elements to sure success." 

We carried with us two tents, one for the use of the 
General and his nephew, Lieutenent Bush, and the other 
for the rest of the staff, and we had them both pitched 
on this occasion, but after finishing our talk the General 
said : 

" Bugler, sound Taps, now. Boys, let us all go into 
my tent and sleep together to-night, for it may be the last 
opportunity we will ever have." 

B} r this time the spell had seized all of us, and we fol- 
lowed into that tent like those following a bier. Wq 
spread our blankets in one continuous bed, the General's 
in the center; and having seated ourselves upon them, the 
General read the eiii. Psalm, after which, having prayed 
fervently for our protection in the touring events, we laid 
down and went to sleep. Never did seven hearts seem to 
reciprocate more fully each other's interests ; and never 
did better teeling bind "heart to heart and mind to 
mind." 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



9 



, There is an enchanting something in the soldier's life 
out of which grows more brotherly love, more pure un- 
adulterated friendship, than can be felt anywhere else. 
Whether it springs from a common interest, or common 
aim, or whether from the probability of a sudden "taking 
off," or what, it certainly prunes the disposition and 
weeds the heart of all selfishness and jealousy. 

A "still small voice" seemed to say to the General that 
on the morrow night five of the seven would be missing, 
and that in a few days he should be gathered to his 
fathers. 

The morning of the 5th of May opened up very fair. 
A few guns reported early three or four miles to the south- 
ward, where General Crawford lay with his division. 
Rumors were current that Lee was falling back to Gor- 
donsville, and the firing was supposed to be on his rear 
guard. But events that followed soon proved that this 
supposition was wrong. At an early hour we moved out 
in the road, in the direction of Crawford, but had not 
gone more than two miles before we met an aide hurry- 
ing from Crawford with the news that the enemy were 
advancing through the Wilderness, close upon us. Our 
regiments were at once double-quicked into line, batteries 
thrown into position, w T agons sent to the rear ; and in five 
minutes everything presented the appearance of work. 

In the meantime the general directed me to cover the 
brigade with skirmishers, wich I did by taking five com- 
panies of the 95th Kew T York, and two companies of the 
76th Hew York, and deploying them four or five hundred 
yards in the front. 

We were now fairly in the ill omened Wilderness. So 
dense was the foliage, that the skirmish line was entirely 
obscured from the line of battle. Matters went on until 
11 o'clock A. M., without any appearance of the enemy, 
and General Warren > commanding corps, somewhat doubt* 



10 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



ting the correctness of the report, rode up and said : 

"General Rice, you will advance your brigade skirmish- 
ers two miles south-west, and if you iind the enemy be- 
fore reaching that distance, hold all the ground you gain 
until the line of battle gets up ; you moving your line for- 
ward as soon as the firing begins." 

Similar orders had been given to all the brigades of our 
division : and General Rice turning to me said : 

"Lieutenant, you will see that these orders are exe- 
cuted?" 

I replied by calling for my horse: but at the same time 
looking significantly at my friend Chisman, who was ly- 
ing at ease on the ground. He well knew that I had been 
in the saddle my full share that morning, and well read 
in my looks, my wishes, for he sprang to his feet with : 

"General, with your permission I will assist Lieutenant 
in advancing the skirmishers." 

" I would be very glad if you would, sir," was the an- 
swer, and he joined me before I reached the line. 

We moved off in conjunction with the skirmishers of 
the 1st brigade on our right, carefully feeling our way 
through the woods. We crept along for a mile as noise- 
lessly as possible, making or hearing no sound louder than 
the cracking of a bush, when suddenly an oavI in our 
front went "hoot, hoot, hoot," " Hallow," says Chisman 
to me, "that owl is not used to his song, or he could do 
better than that." "Hoot, hoot, hoot," went another, 
away off* to the right, and we hurried along the line and 
told the boys to keep a sharp lookout. A few rods further 
on, and the next signal was, bang, whiz, spat, from a rebel 
musket. The enemy was at hand; and whether we fired 
the first guns on that great campaign, is no matter, but 
right kere began the bloody battle of the Wilderness. 

A brisk firing at once began in our front, and soon it 
extending along the whole line. The results were various 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



11 



— charging and being charged, advancing and retireing; 
two or three times our line was broken like a reed, and 
hurled back several hundred yards ; and it was in trying 
to withstand one of these violent onsets, that my horse re- 
ceived a shot in the hip, which made him almost unman- 
ageable. For fifteen minutes we had it hot, and yet no 
sign of the brigade coming up. We had no protection 
on our left, and the rebels overlapped us on that flank, 
we knew not how far. For a slight protection we swung 
back fifty men, at right angles with the front,, yet, with 
this, a thousand men might have marched around to our 
rear, and swept off the last man. A volley of musketry 
broke forth to our right, probably in the rear of the 1st 
brigade. Roar after roar came rumbling through the for- 
est, shaking our hearts with fear, for a thought came in- 
to our minds that it might be our bigrade that had mis- 
taken the direction, or the whole line had borne too much 
to the right, and left us without support. At this time 
Lieutenant Mitchell rode up from the General and con- 
firmed our fears, for he said that he had left the brigade 
but a few minutes before, away to our right, within a 
short distance of the skirmishers. He also bore orders 
from the General to hold out if possible. While Mitchell 
was with us, the rebels charged us again, and were re- 
pulsed, as we thought at the time, along the whole line 
of the brigade, but subsequent events proved that they 
had succeeded in driving back a hundred men of the 1st 
brigade, immediately on our right, the density of the for- 
est preventing us from discovering the fact. We begged 
Mitchell to make haste to represent to the General the 
exposed condition of our left flank, which not only en- 
dangered us, but the whole army. He dashed away to 
return again in five minutes, with the Generals orders 
thereon. We waited in painful suspense five minutes, and 
he had not come— ten minutes, and there were no signs 



12 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



of him ; dangers thickening about us the while. I called 
to Chisman that I would go myself and see what was the 
matter, and what we should do. 

I galloped off to the right, in the direction of the bat- 
tle, as fast asl could, dodging under the limbs and from 
the trees, and had not gone far, when about crossing a 
beaten path I chanced to glance to the left, and there 
stood a man within thirty feet of me, in the path facing 
th© rear, with a musket hanging in his right hand. Not 
noticing him very closely, it occurred to me in the mo- 
ment that he was a skulker from our skirmish line, and 
I yelled out at him, " What are you doing back here, 
sir?" Whereupon he replied : 

"Are you a Yankee, sir?" 

A rebel — quick as thought I jerked my horse to the 
left, plunged both spurs into his sides, snatched my revol- 
ver, and in a twinkle was upon him. He jerked his mus- 
ket to his shoulder, but in his hurry had failed to raise 
the hammer, and before he could recover and raise it, he 
had to jump out of the path to keep from being ridden 
down, and before he could rally I had my revolver point- 
ing at his breast, with a demand for his surrender. His 
gun fell to his side, and I then commanded him to double 
quick to the rear. All possible haste was made to get 
him away from there, for I feared that he might have 
comrades close at hand, who would come to the rescue. 
Having hurried him to the rear a few hundred yards I 
began thus to interrogate him : 

" What were you doing out there, sir? " 

"My duty, sir." 

"Who placed you there?" 

"My officer." 

" Were you alone? " 

" Perhaps not, sir?" 

" What regiment do you belong to? " 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER* 



13 



" Eighth Mississippi/' 

He was a soldier who knew well his duty — not to give 
the enemy information. He turned back to me at one 
time, with a most malicious look, and said : 

"Well, I'll be d— d if you are making much off of me." 

"Why," said I. 

"Because, sir, I had the exquisite pleasure a few mo- 
ments ago of escorting one of your officers to my 
Colonel!" 

" What kind of a looking man was he?" 

" He had on fine clothes, had a moustache, a red badge 
on his breast, and was riding a roan horse." 

Mitchell's delay was now accounted for — poor fellow, he 
had reported to the wrong man, 

I first found a regiment of the Pennsylvania Reserve, 
thrown out as flankers on the left of the line of battle. 
Here I left my prisoner, and dashed up in the rear of the 
first regiment engaged, which proved to be the 147th 
Kew York, one of our brigade. The battle was raging 
in its fury. Colonel Miller had just fallen, and the Ma- 
jor but a few minutes before, and had been carried back. 
It was only after a dozen efforts that I learned from a 
Lieutenant that the General had just gone up the line. 
Bullets were hissing and hitting everywhere. My horse 
was wild as a ranger. I headed him northward, gave 
him the rein ; for the sooner he took me out of there 
the better he would please me. He went frying through 
the timber, squatting and dodging at the bullets and 
trees. While in full speed, a ball struck him near my 
leg — saw him fall — saw his nose plough along the ground 
and double under his breast — I saw or remember no more. 



14 



SEVEN -MONTHS A PRISONER, 



CHAPTER II. 

Parker's store — lieutenant shelton — first escape — shel« 

ton's strategy the wilderness battlefield and its 

dead the whippo-wils of the rapidan the grievous 

mistake shelton gives out takes refuge at mrs. 

b.'s charley, the rebel the ignominious betrayal. 

Boardman, of the 147th New York, told how it was: 
"In the rear ©f their regiment my horse was killed while 
in full speed, and, in falling, threw me against a tree, then 
pitched headlong against me. Soon after my misfortune 
our battle line gave way, and the enemy possessed the 
place and me." 

We will next begin at Parker's Store. This place is 
now in history ; not from its importance, but for the events 
it witnessed. 

An old house, built fifty years ago, sits by the thorough- 
fare leading down from Fredericksburg to Orange Court 
House, in the midst of a cleared apot of live or six acres. 
All around it is the wilderness. If Mr. Parker was a 
merchant, and had customers, it is a novel question where 
they came from; for truly, I do not believe there were a 
dozen families in a dozen miles' radius. Business had 
been suspended and the place deserted many years, no 
doubt, for much of the roof had fallen oft, and here and 
there a weatherboard was swinging by one end. This 
was Parker's Store, where, on the 6th of May, 1864, lay 
one thousand rebel and fifty Federal soldiers, bleeding and 
dying. 

I awoke, as if from sleep, about 7 o'clock in the morn- 
ing. I tried, but failed to get up. My left eye was en- 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



15 



tirely closed, and I had a misery in my left breast and 
shoulder. I was hurt, but knew not how or how much. 
The first thing that attracted my attention was a column 
of troops hurrying along the road silently, but on a forced 
march. "What ! have they gray clothes on ? Ko ; it is 
my injured sigbt. I rubbed my eyes and tried it again, 
with the same result; then I turned on my elbow and 
looked around me. Those immediately near had on the 
blue, as had also a soldier bending over a prostrate form 
with a canteen. 

" Soldier, come here. Am I a prisoner?" 

" Yes." 

I asked no more questions, but lay back, and was a 
little more willing to u give up the ghost/' just then, than 
I ever expect to be again. I had no hope ; mortally 
wounded, no doubt, and in the hands of the enemy, to be 
tortured unto death ; or, if I recovered, they would send 
me south, in the hottest months, to some prison pen, to 
starve or die of epidemic. But I was not so badly injured 
as I had at first thought. My head and left breast were 
badly bruised, but it was the excessive loss of blood that 
made me feel so near the end. Had I been in a Federal 
hospital I would have been up in twenty-four hours ; but 
mush and gruel, and a very® small piece of bacon, were 
three days in getting me on my feet, and for five days 
more I went moping about, though mending faster than 
I appeared to be. It was a rule of the hospital, as fast as 
the prisoners got able, to send them south. As strength 
returned to my body a notion came into my head to escape. 
I wanted to be free. My idea was, that it would be more 
easily accomplished from that hospital than anywhere 
else. I did not make much ado about my convalescence ; 
in fact, I said nothing about it, and nobody else was con- 
cerned. 



16 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



On the morning of the 13th the doctor made his rounds 
for those to be sent south. For some reason, best known 
to myself, I was still quite bad; but my feebleness was 
more on account of prison pens and short rations than 
injuries. He felt my pulse, looked at my tongue, sounded 
my breast, shook his head, and went off. 

Filteen minutes afterward I was lying by Lieutenant 
Shelton, of Battery D, 1st New York Light Artillery, 
arranging for our escape. He was wounded in the leg, 
below the knee, but ambitious as a Bonaparte. He was 
young, and bad been but recently promoted, and the love 
of honor with his battery was stronger than the fear of 
rebels, or of losing his leg by an eighty miles tramp to 
Alexandria. 

Said he; u If you are going to-night, I am going with 
you." 

He was the ablest one in the hospital, but, much as I 
desired company, I seriously doubted his ability for the 
task. Bat we arranged to go at dark. During the day ? 
Sbekon traded a jack-knife for a pone of corn bread; 
Colonel Miiier gave us a compass, and Lieutenant Ham- 
ilton a map of Virginia. I say gave — for we had nothing 
to give in exchange. My sword, my revolver, cap, knife, 
pocketbook, handkerchief, diary, even my tooth brush 
were all gone as booty to my captors. 

When night came, we took adieus and messages from 
our suffering comrades, and went off the back way into 
the woods. There were but few guards to give us trouble ; 
here and there went a patrol about the camp or hospital, 
and there was a picket post a few hundred rods off on 
each direction of the road. We learned enough during 
the day to elude all the posts, and had caution enough to 
follow close after one patrol and be gone before another 
came along. "We slipped noislessly through the woods 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



17 



until we had passed the picket post, theu we weut on the 
road and headed for Alexandria. We much desired to 
keep the woods altogether, but the brush and bushes con- 
stantly hurting Shelton's leg, we found it impracticable. 
Shelton locked his arm in mine for support, and with a 
stick in the other hand seemed to get along with but little 
difficulty. 

About a mile on the way we came t© another field hos- 
pital by the road side, and seeing nobody astir, we con- 
tinued straight on ; but while the lights from the hospital 
fires were still shining on our backs, suddenly there came 
ringing from the front: 

"Halt!" and a guard stood in the middle of the road 
before us. 

" Let's go back to the hospital ; my leg is hurting me," 
said Shelton loudly. And we turned about and went back 
without further disturbance. Having cleared the hospital 
again, we entered the woods, slipped around the fires, and 
returned to the road — this time, beyond the picket. 

The road led us across the battlefield, and the noisome 
smells announced it long before it was reached. We 
would have shunned it had there been any chance — but 
there was none. The rebels had told us of its condition 

9- 

and like every one that had lost friends there we shud- 
dered at the thought of seeing it. The stench — it was 
awful — that is enough to say. Men and horses lay thick 
in the road in process of natural decay. 

"Right up there, on that mound, is where I lost two- 
guns and my liberty," said Shelton; I must go up to the 
spot again." 

We went up, and there lay men and horses thicker 
than ever. 

" This body is Corporal Tole ; he fell at my very side* 
This one is George Mullen, No. 2 at the gun. This other 

2 



18 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



is Sergeant Linden. He veteranized and married but a 
month before. Now, let us step down to those bushes 
^nd see the last of cousin Henry Stiles ; the dear boy was 
killed dead while carrying me off the field." 

The body was half submerged, but we lifted it tenderly 
out to a dryer spot to crumble. Shelton then examined 
every pocket for some relic foi the broken-hearted mother, 
but the theiving enemy had been there before, and none 
could be found. 

We lingered in the society of the dead for an hour, and 
verily it was a task to leave them. Like the dog on the 
plams, that finds society and will starve by his dead mas- 
ter's side. For, as ghastly as these decaying bodies ap- 
peared in the moonlight, there were spirits that seemed 
to arise from them to hold communion with us. They 
were all strangers to me at this point, but had I known 
where the bones of Thomas A.shby, of John Doyal, of 
William Reynolds, of John Hornaday, of Henry Hoadly, 
of Captain Clayton, and many other friends were resting 
I should have been constrained to see them before leaving 
the field. 

We decided to cross the Kapidan at Ely's Ford, and 
from Wilderness Tavern we took the road to that point. 
Our strength, stimulated by excitement and hope, lasted 
us wonderfully. The further we went, and the faster we 
went, the smarter Shelton seemed to get. We had no 
other disturbance during the night, and at 3 o'clock a. m. 
we sat down to rest upon the bluff, one hundred yards 
from the Ford, having traveled nearly twelve miles. Our 
object was to reconnoiter the Ford by daylight, before 
crossing, lest there be a picket on one side or the other. 
Oh ! that horrible May morning. With all the serious 
impressiveness of the battlefield we had just passed upon 
our minds; sick and sore; within the enemy's lines, and 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER, 



19 



probably within a hundred yards of his muskets; in the 
stillness of the night; by this ill-omened river- — these 
things made us cling together like two lost children, start- 
Ing at every sound. Then there were those birds, in 
countless numbers, whose songs are said to be melodious, 
but which seemed to us, on that night, like the cries of 
so many devils, sweeping up and down that dismal river, 
screaming without ceasing their " whippo-wil, whippo-wil, 
whippo-wil." 

As soon as it was light enough to distinguish an object 
on the other side, we pulled off our boots and crawled, 
down to the Ford. We listened for several minutes, and 
no sign or sound of human being coming from the other 
side, we arose and stepped into the water. But we did 
not listen quite long enough ; most unfortunately, we 
started across five minutes too soon; for before we got to 
the other side, a man came running to the south bank, 
shouting at the top of his voice: 

"Halt, there! halt!! halt!!!" 

How happy we would have been to know that this man 
was a member of Captain Bryant's company, of the 5th 
]New York Cavalry, who-e company being out on a scout, 
had stopped upon the hill to breakfast and feed, and this 
man was coming to watch at the Ford for the time. The 
thought never entered our minds that he could be any- 
thing else but a rebel, and we ran for dear life, not even 
taking time to put on our boots ; but over the hill we flew, 
and into the wood, entirely forgetting our debility. 

Heretofore I had been a support to Shelton; now, I 
shouted to him to wait. We continued to run for more 
than a mile, fearing they would pursue us, and took refuge 
in the midst of a pond between two hills. It was a favor- 
able place to hide, being covered with a dense thicket, 
yet the spot where we rested was elevated and dry, but 



20 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



proved to be in unpleasant proximity to a house, for 
soon we heard the murmuring of voices and hallooing of 
children upon the opposite hill. We feared they were 
rebels hunting for us, and we lay down upon our faces as 
still and noiseless as two logs. My exertion in the morn- 
ing had re-opened the wound in my breast, and I had a 
frightful hemorrhage in the bushes. Shelton's leg, too, 
began to swell and pain him. That which seemed as 
hideous to us this day as the song of the whippo-wil, was 
the never ending, never varying croaking and chattering 
of the frogs. They hopped about us, and over us, and 
one ugly creature had the impudence to perch himself 
upon my friend's back and tune his harp. 

Two or three times snakes glided along, shaking their 
tongues in our very faces, and yet we felt that we dare 
not stir to destroy them. A dog, too, chasing a rabit, ran 
upon us, but, to his credit, turned away without barking. 
All day long we heard the noise upon the hill, and all 
day long we lay quiet. A cloud came up in the after- 
noon, and poured torrents of rain down upon us for two 
hours. It saturated us from head to foot. The water 
raised over our little island, but we took seats upon a log 
and held out until nightfall. Shelton's leg had swollen 
terribly, and was feverish and painful ; but after the rain 
he kept it submerged, which afforded some relief. 

When dark came we crawled out of the bushes and 
briars, and after a little rambling found and took the road 
leading to Kelly's Ford of the Rappahanock. The night 
was cloudy and dark, and the roads slippery and rough, 
but the increasing hope of escape gave us strength to get 
along briskly. Twice we met horsemen in the road, but 
by stepping into the bushes eluded them. Once we met 
some citizens in a wagon ; they had been " picking up ,r 
in the Federal camps, and were talking loud about their 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



21 



victory at Spottsylvania, and the killing of General Sedg- 
wick. Our aim for the night was to cross the Rappahan- 
nock at Kelly's, and reach Mrs. M 's, where we had 

previously made our headquarters, and where I believed 
we would find some favor — a thirteen miles journey. 

Several times I asked Shelton how he was getting 
along. 

"Oh, first rate," he always replied, and a time or two 
refused to rest when I was anxious. But about midnight 
he began to hang heavier on my arm. I asked nothing 
about it, thought nothing about it.; for he had so often 
assured me that he was doing well, I had no doubt of it 
The hope of soon being over the Rappahannock, among 
trusty friends, and in a country little infested with rebels, 
so completely occupied my mind that I could not think 
of the possibility of -a calamity near at hand. Yet it 
came, before the morning, from a source I little dreamed 
of. 

" II my leg is killing me. I must sit down," said 

Shelton about 2 o'clock in the morning. 

We had traveled distance enough to have reached Kel» 
ley's, but had taken the wrong read at the forks, and were 
now three miles away. 

Shelton's leg was fearfully swollen : so much so that it- 
was impossible to raise his pants without splitting them. 
After resting some time we tried it again, but Shelton 
now found it more difficult and painful to walk than when 
he stopped. It was next to impossible to go at all now, 
and in persisting in it he could see inevitable loss of life 
or limb, He gave up in despair, imploring me not to for- 
sake him in that helpless condition. The weather was 
quite cold, and our clothes being yet wet, we decided to 
build a fire and remain by it till morning. 

When daylight arrived we discovered a house within a 



22 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



few hundred yards, and after a little reconnoitering found 

it to the house of Mrs. B , of good Union report. 

A column of smoke was already ascending from the chim- 
ney, and a lady was chopping wood in the yard. We 
concluded that 1 should assist my friend to the house, ask 
for concealment, and if granted. I should stay with him 
until able to go on; if denied I should leave him and 
proceed alone. With my aid, and that of a stick, we 
succeeded in reaching the house. We were met by Mrs. 
B and five children, three of whom were young la- 
dies. The war had impoverished, but not dispossessed 
the family of goodness. They received us kindly and 
sympathetically, and readily accepted our proposition for 
concealment. 

" Yes; I could not think of turning you away, lest my 
iniquity should sometime be visited upon my dear Charles* 
who was driven into the rebel army." 

We were shown into the house, to seats before an old 
fashioned Virginia fire place. Every hand was set to work 
in doing something for us. First, hot water and band- 
ages. Second, clean, dry clothing. [I may mention here 
that the house was within sight of the camp lately left by 

one of our eorj s, and from whence Mrs. B ? s family 

had collected large supplies of abandoned clothing and 
meat.] Third, some army coffee and " hard tack/' 

Soon Shelton's wound was dressed, both had on dry 
suits, and a satisfaction of breakfast, and then we might 
have been seen crawling up into an old ricketty garret 
to hide. A comfortable bed was spread for us up there> 
and we were directed to feel perfectly secure, as the entire 
family would observe the strictest secrecy in the matter. 
The old lady, particularly, was most profuse in her atten- 
tions to both. The wound was bathed and poulticed a 
number of times every day, and the greatest care observed 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



23 



to provide such food as was best suited to our condition. 
Our own mothers would scarcely have done more. Seven 
days did we lay in that garret, a profound secret, only in 
the family, and in a few days more would have renewed 
our journey. 

In the meantime Charles, the son, a member of the 5th. 
Virginia Cavalry, had been at home twice, and hardly a 
day passed but what more or less rebels had eaten dinner 
bel~>w. They belonged to Stuart's command; and I add 
to the shame of our arms, had been sent into Culpepper 
county to pick up deserters from < ur army. The number 
of these cowards that ran away from the battle in the 
Wilderness was alarming. They had to take refuge in 
our old camps to get something to eat, and one day, 
through the little window in the garret, we counted twelve 
of them in one gang. One party of five called at Mrs. 
B 's inquiring for rebel soldiers — they wanted to sur- 
render. Another squad of three came in one day, with 
their guns, and demanded dinner or blood. I must say, 
however, that these scoundrels were mercenary substitutes 
from eastern regiments, who had no more desire For the 
honor or the success of the Federal than the Confederate 
arms. 

Although Charles had been home twice since our con- 
cealment, hi had not the slightest inkling of the matter. 
A third time he came about 2 o'clock in the afternoon, 
havirg ridden his horse, as he averred, twelve hours with- 
out a feed. He remembered some corn which his mother 
had hidden in the garret for bread, and, without consult- 
ing her, made for the ladder. His mother caught him 
before he got up, drew him back, and was obliged to tell 
him all. She elaborated the circumstances ; who we were, 
what we had done for her, and what the rebels would do 
for her in the event that they should find out that she was 



24 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



harboring Yankees. They would bura her house, drive 
them from the country, and perhaps lodge them all in 
prison. Charles fully understood it all, and assured her 
that he should observe the strictest secrecy. The good 
old woman was perfectly delighted, was very sorry she 
had so long kept her secret, and brought Charles up and 
introduced him as an " additional friend, her son, from 
the rebel army." 

As proud of Charles as his mother seemed to be, I did 
not like his manner, and Shelton liked it less. He was 
"as mild a mannered man as ever scuttled ship or cut a 
throat," young, and had some u gift of gab." His con- 
versation was as plaintive as a minister in his first year ? 
and he really seemed more distressed about our condition 
than we were ourselves. lie remained with us an hour 
sympathizing, moaned when he saw the hole in Shelton' s 
leg, and sighed when I coughed. In taking his leave he 
was so hopeful that we would give ourselves no concern 
about our safety ; that we should stay content until able 
to go ; that we would reach our lines in safety, etc. And 
chief among his kindnesses he also insisted that we re- 
main at least a week longer, when he would be back home 
again, that he might take his horse, a mighty trusty fel- 
low, and set us over the Rappahannock some night. He 
over did the matter. When he spoke to his sister below, 
Shelton turned to me and said : 

" , if you think you are able to cross the river to- 
night, I will consent that you leave me, for that fellow will 
betray us." 

The mother soon returned to the garret to reassure us 
of Charley's fidelity — he was always a good boy; that she 
would stand between us and danger from him, etc. 

It can hardly be believed when I add that the villain 
was back in less than an hour, with three other rebel sol- 
diers and two extra horses, to carry us to some hospital 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



25 



on the other side of the Rapidan, and would have done 
it immediately had not the good old lady interceded for 
us. She was a mother who loved her son, but seemed just 
then to love honor more. The treachery of the scoundrel 
appeared as much to the distress of his mother as to us. 
She cried, she talked, and she abused the wretch hand- 
somely. 

"I want you to go back to your regiment, and stay 
there, and never come home again, if it be only to abuse 
the confidence of your mother." 

A compromise was effected by the intercession of the 
old lady, wherein it was agreed, upon the part of the 
rebels, that we should remain there a week or ten days, 
or as much longer as was necessary to improve our con- 
dition sufficiently to be moved without dnnger to life or 
limb; and on our part, to give our paroles of honor " not 
to leave that house until ordered to by a Confederate offi- 
cer" 

The paroles were written and signed, and there was 
some distribution of Shelton's effects; one thief started 
away with his boots, but the old lady intercepted and re- 
covered them. 

There was nothing but trouble at Mrs. B 's the bal- 
ance of that day. The mother and sisters thought they 
could never forgive Charley; and then there was fear that 
the rebels would visit some punishment upon them for 
harboring us. The good woman avowed that before the 
week was out, she would have some conveyance to carry 
us to the other side of the Rappahannock, and send us on 
to Alexandria; that we should not be so mercilessly be- 
trayed in her house. 

But it was not in the Divine arrangement of things that 
we should then succeed in escaping. The second day 
afterward three others came with orders from some Colonel 



26 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRIS0NE1 . 



on the other side of the Rapidan to bring us over, dead or 
alive. There was no alternative now. There was no 

compromising with this party. Mrs. B thought there 

was, for she repeatedly asserted that we should not go. 
She knew not what arbitrary things military orders are, 
and because the guards persisted in taking us at once she 
called them "heartless dogs." 

We, did not go, however, until that magnanimous good 
woman had supplied each with two shirts, two pairs of 
socks, towel, soap, blanket, and myself a cap. With these 
things before us, on the horse, she approached us with 
streaming eyes, and we took her hand, perhaps for the 
last time. 

I have never heard of Mrs. B — —since that time, and 
probably never will again; but I have this tribute to write 
of her: She was loyal in Virginia, a Christian in works, 
and a faithful friend in adversity. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



27 



CHAPTER III. 

)FF FOR THE SOUTH THE THIEVES AT THE RAPID AN SHFLTON'S 

TROUBLE WITH HIS NEW CLOTHES THE > ORTH CAROLINA 

LIEUTENANT SHELTON's RESOLUTE PLUCK — GENERAL WADS- 
WORTH SHELTON LEFT BEHIND ALL ALONE NOW TIM. HAY- 
DEN GENERAL LEE'S HEADQUARTERS COLONEL RTCHARD- 

SON YANK THE POOR INDIAN GORDONSVILL E AND STAR- 
VATION CHARLOTTSVILLE LYNCHBURG PAN TVF M ( ) NT f"M — ■ 

RELIC OF THt, INSTITUTION DANVILLE JAMESTOWN BILL. 

REES AUGUSTA MACON CAMP OGLETHORPF HOW THEY 

TOOK US IN WHO MKT INSIDE — THE GERMAN CAPTAIN TUN- 
NELING THE FOURTH OF JULY. 

It was back across the Rapidan and towards Lee's 
Army, which had b} T this time crawled back near North 
A/nna, we were taken. We were received at German ia 
Ford by a guard from the other side, who met us mid- 
way the stream and demanded our boots. One fellow 
threatened to drown us if we did not pull them off be- 
fore passing the river, and a second gathered Shelton by 
the foot, and cried to his comrade: 

"Dave! hold that hoss while I pull the boots off this 
d_d Yankee." 

But Dave wanted the boots too badly himself to co- 
operate and so the river was passed without the much 
coveted treasure being secured by any one. I do not 
blame them much for wanting Shelton's boots, for they 
were new, and an excellent pair, fine, high, and beauti- 
fully stitched, such as even Yankee soldiers would de- 
light in pulling from the feet of rebels, and just such as 
every newly fledged lieutenant huys. Poor boy. ITe had 
scarcely worn his boots and straps a fortnight before his 
capture, and to lose his first official clothes before they 
had lost their lustre, was deplorable. He did not lose his 
boots here ; but he lost what was worse- -his straps and 



28 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



jacket. The Lieutenant in command, a North Carolinian, 
(and I am sorry I have forgotten the name) did not need 
the hoots himself, and protected them ; but the lustrous 
jacket suited him well for the summer's campaign, and 
with all complacency he stepped up with — 

" Yank, pull off that 'ar coat. I want to try it on." 

Earnest remonstrances proved fruitless, for the rogue 
would have nothing but the jacket. So, off it came, and 
in its stead on went a long-tailed, coarse, brown, jeans 
coat, which Shelton had on his back when he ran the 
gauntlet of the rebel guard line, at Columbia, six months 
aftei wards. 

I fared much better at the hands of these rebels than 
my comrade, for the old, weather-beaten garments I had 
on were unenviable, and I had but little trouble. This 
was the out-post of the rebel vidette, and they were in 
communication with Lee's army, forty miles off — the 
posts standing five miles apart. Here we lost our horses, 
and had to take it afoot to the next post. I managed to 
get along pretty well, but poor Shelton suffered terribly. 
His wound had been suppurating most profusely for four 
or five daj T s, and was swollen to twice its natural size; yet, 
if he murmured once, or asked one favor from the moun- 
ted guards, I have forgotten it now. 

"We were reported to the next post, a written receipt 
asked and given for two Yankees, and in fifteen minutes 
more, we were on the next five mile stretch. By this 
time I was very much fatigued, and my injuries were 
hurting me some ; and had I not felt that it was "go and 
live, or stay and die," I certainly would have had some 
rest. But on we went, without a halt, and I was as much 
spurred on by Sh el ton's pluck as rebel sabres. 

The task, however, was too much. This brave boy 
dragged along while there was strength enough in his 
poor body to move, but at last sank down in the road and 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER, 



20 



gave ft up. The heartless wretches that had us in charge ? 
tried to drive him up with their sabres, and one villian, 
drawing his revolver, cocked it, and held it directly at 
his breast with — 

" , you, move on, or I'll blow your heart out." 

The heroic courage of this boy here, was worthy of a 
.martyr; for as great as the impending danger seemed to 
] be, as much as he suffered in body and mind, asked no 
| respite, uttered not one complaint, nor asked any assis- 
tance or favor at the hands of his enemies. After some 
i parley, one of the guards dismounted, put $helton on the 
horse, and soon we were again under way. 

Before reaching the third post we were taken across 
a part of the field of the Wilderness that had been fought 
twenty days before. It was a dense forest on either side 
I of the road — not a man or beast had been buried by 
either army, out of that vast number killed — and, not 
enough that death should strike them low, but a devour- 
I lug and relentless tire had swept over the field, burning 
the hair and garments from the dead, and the hope of 
. life from the wounded; and now that three weeks had 
passed, and the worms done their work, a thousand skele- 
tons, in black, charred shrouds, with empty eye sockets 
and glaring teeth, seemed to mock us, and cry out, "we 
were murdered in the flames." If there is one cruelty that I 
I suffered at the hands of the rebels that I cannot forgive, 
] it was the wanton act of driving us over that battle-field., 
. with no other object than to add one more thorn to our 
already suffering condition. But we got through, and 
the next time we halted was at post No. 3, a rebel field 
j hospital, a few miles south of the Wilderness battle field. 
Here we were lodged for the night, and shown where 
the old hero and patriot, General Wadsworth, paid the 
, price of his patriotism. Here, in this solitary, nameless 
i ^pot, in the midst of an ill-omened forest, without a pil- 



30 SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 

low or a tear, on the 7th day of May, 1864, died an old 
man who had given more to his country of fortune and 
life, than any man who had ever lived in it. The artifi- 
cial parts of this hospital was such as may be found in the 
midst of most forests; near a little murky brooK, with no 
shelter but the branches of the trees, and no bedding but 
leaves. r lhere were about lour hundred wounded men 
grouped together here, and among them twenty Feder- 
als, ail badly wounded, bhei ton's leg by this time was 
painiul in the extreme, and I was suffering what 1 would 
have conquered among my friends at home, nearly death, 
but here i was able to go to the brook for a canteen of 
water and dress my friend's wound. In the meantime, a 
negro in attendance had prepared us some mush, and after 
having eaten a liberal quantity, (for it was the hrst of any- 
thing we had had since leaving Mrs. B's.) we stretched 
ourselves together near an oid log, feeling the cords of 
frienuship bind us closer and closer, as we expected to be 1 
parted m the morning. 

'inat memorable night was full of horror to me; ex- 
pecting next morning to be driven turther fcouth, aione 
and a prisoner, weak and suffering, and without even the 
presence of a Federal soldier to encourage me. This 
seemed enough ; but to add tenfold, my sleep was either 
broken in that frightful lonesome place, by tne moans or 
demoniac yells of the suffering wounded, or the curses of 
the annoyed guard, or disturbed by alternate dreams of 
home and cruel jailors and horrible prison pens ; and as 
much as I hated to see the dawn appear in the east, to 
separate me from my friend, I could not wish it delayed. 

That night, wakeful as we w r ere, some rogue got Sheh 
ton's cap, and before he left there they also got his boots, 
so that when we met again, six weeks afterwards at Ma- 
con, Georgia, his embroidered cap was supplanted by an 
old greasy wool hat, his new jacket by the veritable 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



31 



brown jeans; bis boots by a pair of sun-burned, sun- 
cracked, rusty brogans of the Southern army style. 

Sure enough, next morning Shelton was unable to 
move ; so, when I had taken my allowance of mush, I 
pressed his hand "farewell" and resumed my march to 
Dixie. As feeble as I was, they got me over eighteen 
miles before sundown, to post IsTo. 7, where I was re- 
ceipted for by a Virginia Captain, a rather clever fellow, 
who, at my request, kept me over night. I was very weak 
and tired when I sat down upon the grass with the Cap- 
tain ; but after having drank a cup of his hot coffee and 
eaten a piece of soft bread and cold ham, and taken a 
"few drops" of Virginia hospitality, I felt invigorated and 
talked an hour about the war. At eight o'clock I wrapped 
my blanket around me and slept soundly the entire 
night. 

The next day I expected to reach Lee's headquarters, 
and I much wondered how I should feel, or what I should 
see in that invincible Army of Northern Virginia, that 
had been talked of so much since my capture. I was off 
again at 7 A. M.; was feeling better than the day previ- 
ous, and got along with more ease; my guard was kind, 
and let me rest frequently. About noon we reached post 
8, just after the relief had returned from picket. I do 
not know the emergency to dispatch me in such a hurry; 
but the officer in charge seemed determined that I should 
proceed at once the remaining tour miles, to the head- 
quarters of the Army. The men had just fed their hor- 
ses and were setting themselves about for Jdinner when 
the officer, probably out of fear for his own haversack, 
called to one ot his men to saddle his horse and report 
me to Col. Richardson. This the man did not feel in- 
clined to do until after dinner, and he was not very po- 
lite in expressing himself. He swore he would not, and 

m 



32 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



his officer swore he should. The soldier's horse had not 
been fed since yesterday, and he himself had had nothing 
warm to eat since supper, besides he had done more duty 
than the rest that day, and was unwell. The officer did 
not agree with him, and a perfect war of oaths was waged 
for ten minutes before the horse was saddled. 

To assist me in the good graces of the soldier, I re- 
marked to the officer, that I was very tired, and should 
like mighty well to rest half an hour, while the guard 
cooked his dinner. But it did no good. His dignity rested 
upon his autority, and go now he had commanded, and go 
we should. 

Sluggishly and sullenly the guard crawled into his sad- 
dle, persisting that he would not take me far, and mut- 
tered to a companion near by . 

"I 'low to kill the d — d Yankee as soon as we get to 
the woods." 

"Rack out, here!" were his words — and I racked. 
" Faster," and I quickened a little ; all the time trying to 
appear as if I regarded his threats as mere jests, while, 
in reality, I was in the most perfect terror. This incident 
makes me smile now, but when it occurred there was 
anything but humor in it. Few know how I felt. The 
prisoner led to the place of execution, and pardoned on 
the spot knows ; and perhaps r > other, for when I 
thought how angry he was, and how he might shoot me 
in the woods, under pretense of my trying to escape, ! 
had not whereon to hang a hope. My mind was as ac- 
tive as it was distressed. I thought of nearly everything 
in a minute, and decided that if I would escape his ven- 
gence, I must natter him into favor. 

On I went, in a dromedary pace, he cursing me every 
step. 

"My friend, I am a very poor walker, and very much 
out of fix, and I do wish you would give your horse and 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



33 



me a little more time," "the war won't be over to-day," I 
remarked. 

" Hurry on, sir — I intend to give you all the time you 
want, when I get you into the woods," he replied. 

This opened my heart afresh ; but, bracing myself up 
again, I continued : 

" Oh, I would rather have my marching a little more 
distributed — I stand it better, and can make more dis- 
tance in the end ;" and further added : " that officer of 
yours must be a heartless dog to treat you as he did back 
there. If an officer in our army were to abuse and curse 
one of his men as that fellow did you, he would be at 
work on the Dry Tortugas in less than a month." 

" Yes," said he, "he is a — rascal ! — a young pimp who 
drove a few niggers around before the war, and now 
thinks he must drive soldiers around the same way — the 
first time we get into a fight I bet I'll stop his fun." 

"From what I had heard of you rebs, I supposed you 
were all such men as he — cruel and cowardly to a priso- 
ner, but, verily, he is the only one I have met sinee my 
capture who has not treated me like a gentleman. " 

"What regiment do you belong to ?" 

" Second Virginia." 

"Ah, I have heard of your regiment before. You 
fought our cavalry at Kelly's Ford. I have heard our 
dragoons say that yours was the only regiment of 
Southern cavalry they feared, and moreover, when one 
of our wounded soldiers was captured at Kelly's, and 
some North Carolinians had robbed him, a party of the 
2d Virginia came up and made them restore everything 
they had taken, and since then your regiment has been 
held in high esteem in our brigade." 

Thus the conversation went on, and I could soon see 
that I was getting a hold on him. Nearly three years 

in the army had taught me that to gain a soldier's esteem 

3 



34 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



and awaken his pride, was to incidentally speak of the 
gallantry of his command ; or if you wish to awaken his 
wrath to violence, speak of its cowardice. 

I made a perfect conquest, as the gentle reader will 
perceive when I add that before we had gone two miles 
of our journey, or before we had passed that much 
dreaded woods, I was mounted upon the horse, and the 
guard walking at my side. 

Tim. Harden was by all odds the roughest mannered 
rebel I ever had directly to do with ; but in him was a 
faithful exemplification of the old maxim : "the harder 
the hull, the sweeter the kernel." When I reached his 
heart I found it full of kind offices. 

We found Colonel Richardson about 3 o'clock, p. m., 
snugly at rest in a marquee, with half a dozen well 
dressed rebel officers about him. I was led into their 
midst, receipted for as one Yankee, and the guard dis^ 
missed. 

Colonel R. raising his spectacles and pen, asked : 
•"What is your name and rank, sir?" 
« * * * My rank is First Lieutenant." 
"To what command did you belong, sir?" 
"To the staff of General Rice?" 

" Indeed ! It occurs to me that we have already here a 
relic of General Rice's headquarters. Bob, go and bring 
• Yank, here." 

Now, I was in a quandary — a relic of General Rice's 
headquarters, and an order to "go bring Yank, here." 
Was it possible that I was so soon to meet some one of 
my old companions? It was to me a moment of hope 
and of doubt. My heart would leap and recoil, bound 
and then fall back again. The suspense would have been 
intense, had it not been for the thousand questions asked 
me by the curious crowd I was in. But right soon, while 
I was in the midst of an explanation, up dashed negro 



SEVEN MONTES A PRISONER. 



35 



Bob on a horse I knew as well as my brother. He was a 
most beautiful animal when I last saw him, a dark bay, 
round, up-headed, spirited fellow, and the sound of drum 
or band made him as proud and perfect a picture as ever 
was Bucephalus or Seiim. lie was quite a pet about 
headquarters for his kindness and tricks, and was ridden 
and lost by my friend Lieutenant Chisman. He had been 
much jaded, and looked thin now, and when I spoke to 
him, "Whoa, Frank," the poor animal looked at me so 
piteously, that I could hardly restrain a tear. He was 
caparisoned exactly as when I last saw him on the field 
of the Wilderness, with the same bridle, breast-straps, 
saddle-bags, and even the identical holster on the horn 
of the saddle. 

Said I, "Did you catch anybody with that horse?" 

Said Hichardson, "We did, sir, his rider;" and, turn- 
ing to his books, showed that it was recorded. There it 
was, in a heavy hand, "Homer Chisman, 1st Lieutenant, 
I. G. General Kice, May tith." 

It came to pass in this way : Soon after I left him on 
the skirmish line, to see the General, and perhaps before 
I was placed hors de combat, a rebel line of battle charged 
him from the rear. They had passed, unperceived, around 
the lei t flank. With a thousand rebel bayonets in his 
rear, he this time made a more desperate onslaught upon 
the rebel skirmishers in his front than ever, and this time 
not only drove, but went through them. Chisman, stick- 
ing to his horse, cried out to the subordinate officers to 
u rally on the center," but only about fifty out of the four 
hundred rallied, including seven officers. The rest were 
all captured on the spot by the enemy in the front or in 
the rear. 

This party of fifty, now in rear of the rebel army, began 
wandering in that dense forest seeking our lines. They 
had little idea of the directions, and less of the positions 



36 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



of the armies. Two or three times, Chisman relates, they 
were within sight of the enemy's line of battle. Eebele 
seemed to be everywhere. They would go this way, that 
way, and the other way, and every time find in their front 
a force of the enemy. Night came upon them in their 
lost condition ; but still they made another effort to es- 
cape. A line of the enemy challenged them, and because 
they would not, or could not, answer satisfactorily, fired 
upon them, killing two or three. After this, they selected 
what they then thought a covert place, and waited till 
daylight. 

With the morning came the enemy on all sides ; they 
had at last realized that a band of lost Yankees were 
wandering among them, and many came to the capture. 
By this time the number had been reduced to forty, and 
most of them had thrown away their guns in despair. 
They stood close together, waiting for the command to 
surrender. There was a roar and a crash from two sides, 
and nearly half of that gallant little band fell bleeding 
to the ground. Chisman, with his own hand, handed 
Frank to the man who gave him to Richardson. 

It may seem selfish in one to say that, as much as I re- 
gretted the misfortune of my friend, I could not possibly 
feel sorry that it had happened. Misery loves company; 
so the first question I asked was, " would I likely be sent 
to the same prison with him," and being answered in the 
affirmative, I felt substantially better from that moment. 

Here I found plenty of blue-coats. Hard by was a 
squad of about five hundred, and among them twelve 
officers. It was the general rendezvous of the army, and 
additions were being made almost every hour. I spent a 
couple of hours in conversation with Colonel Richardson, 
who was a very intelligent man, about politics and the 
war. From him I first learned, what I afterwards found 
to be quite a popular opinion in the South, namely, that 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



37 



a republican form of government is a failure — can not 
endure; and if they succeeded in the war, which they 
surely would, they would not continue six months a re- 
public, but would make Lee dictator until they could 
select a regal family by ballot. As preposterous as this 
thing seemed to a Northman, this fellow, a decided leader 
among them, spoke of it in great earnestness and faith. 
In the evening I went down where the other prisoners 
were herded together, and looked carefully among them 
all for a familiar face. I looked long and thoroughly, 
but failed to find any one that I had ever seen before. 
But a "fellow feeling makes us wondrous kind," and I 
sat down with those strangers with great pleasure, until 
Colonel Richardson came down and invited me to his 
tent. Under the circumstances I went, not that I enjoyed 
his company, but out of curiosity more. It might result 
in something to my advantage; then, as I was a captive, 
I was inclined to improve my opportunity to study my 
enemies. I never could appreciate the bravery or good 
sense of a prisoner who would stubbornly and opprobri- 
ously hold out against those who had his life at their 
command. Captain Smith was one of those who, for the 
luxury of cursing the Provost Marshal, was tied to a tree 
all one afternoon. Private Williams, of Co. K 7th Ind., 
was another. He knocked a guard down and got away, 
but was recaptured while slipping through the picket 
line. Because he would not promise to knock no more 
down, they kept him handcuffed and under special guard 
for two days, when I prevailed upon him to make the 
promise and be untied. For my part, I accepted the 
situation and paid tribute to Csesar. iTor did I lose any- 
thing by it that night. Richardson set me in the circle 
around his supper, and offered me his canteen first. It 
was here I saw the great Chieftain a number of times. 
While we were eating, an old man, in plain dress, with 



SEVEN M0NTH» A PRISONER. 



a single orderly, came riding by on a poor, iron gray 
horse. 

"There goes the modern Napoleon," says one of the 
company, and he proceeded to tell how, at Spottsylvania, 
a few days before, he personally led a desperate but suc- 
cessful charge that had twice failed. 

I have no wonder that the Southern rebels have such 
general reverence for Robert E. Lee. Verily, as rebels, 
they would be very ungrateful if they had not ; for no 
one hundred other men did as much in holding up the 
Confederacy to 1865. Correspondingly, on the other 
hand, more widows and orphans should carry their tears 
and sighs to his door, and the ghosts of more murdered 
men stand around his bed at night, than any hundred 
others; for had Lee taken sides with the Union, the cause 
would have been lost in 1862, and 200,000 loyal lives 
saved. We were detained two days at Army Headquar- 
ters, awaiting the ingathering of a sufficient company to 
justify a guard South. 

During the afternoon of the second day, we saw, far 
over the hills toward the army, . a rushing mob, shouting, 
running, throwing stones and clubs at some object we 
could not discern. Towards our rendezvous they came 
driving, pell meli, and some concern about our safety was 
arising, when we distinguished, running for dear life, a 
lone man, with a thousand infuriated rebels at his heels, 
pelting him with stones. On they came, like a stamped- 
ing army, crying, 44 Kill himl" "Let me kill him!" 
"Give it to the rascal!" fell upon our ears. Now the 
mob is upon us, and the angry tide only staid by the 
guards' bayonets. The subject of all their brutality and 
passion was a poor, emaciated, hollow-eyed, defenseless 
Indian, whom they had captured and taken for a negro. 
The mob stood around our little camp, chattered and 
howled like so many ravenous wolves that had chased a 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



89 



lamb into the fold; they would not be satisfied nor retire 
until a committee of three surgeons had made a thorough 
examination and assured the motley mass that he was an 
Indian. The poor wretch had been chased for a mile, 
and so beaten with stones and sticks that there was 
scarcel} a spot on his body that was not bruised. lie 
belonged to a civilized tribe in Connecticut, and was a 
recruit to a Connecticut regiment. 

We left Lee's headquarters for Gordonsville, five hun- 
dred of us, escorted by a squadron of Virginia cavalry. 
A day and a half's march brought us to the town. This 
was another step into the Confederacy, and another step 
into the knowledge of our enemies. We remained at 
Gordonsville over night, and till nearly noon next day. 
In the meantime the authorities here, to use an army 
term, "went through us" — that is, robbed us of what- 
ever property w T e had that seemed profitable to them. 
By saying authorities, I mean a superior armed force, 
under the direction of a lame Major; and whether the 
business emanated from him, or a higher source, con- 
cerns no one now, for it is enough to know that we w T ere 
called one by one into a small room, which had formerly, 
no doubt, been a grog shop; and while two bra op men 
stood over us with fixed bayonets, a third, directed by the 
lame officer, made us disgorge the contents of all our 
pockets upon the counter. They even made us pull off 
our boots and socks and outer garments, and w T hile the 
Provost examined the articles produced, the man exam- 
ined the pockets to see whether anything had been left. 
They claimed to take nothing but what the Govern- 
ment furnished; but this they contradicted, by leaving 
anything with the private, and taking anything from 
the officer. In practice, their rule was to take from 
the enlisted man every woolen blanket they could find, 



40 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



and whatever other property they wanted. From the 
officers they wanted money and maps — the one would 
bribe guards, the other would facilitate an escape. The 
ivory-handled tooth-brush of Lieutenant Brown, a heavy 
artilleryman, was something "new under the sun" to the 
dignitary, so he threw it into his curiosity collection. So 
was also the silver tobacco-box of Captain Mahon — it 
would make a nice souvenir for Betsy Jane, and it was 
confiscated. 

At Gordonsville we took a lesson in starvation. We 
had had nothing to eat since leaving Lee's army, thirty- 
six hours before; and many as were the promises of ra- 
tions as soon as we got to Gordonsville, we lay around all 
afternoon and till 9 o'clock at night before they came- 
They were then as follows: One pint of unsifted corn- 
meal to each man, measured by the sack, and a mouthful 
of bacon to every two men. This was all they gave us. 
"Not a skillet or a pot to cook it in, and not a splinter of 
wood to cook it with. We were all hungry — yes, very 
hungry; but our appetites were not generally sharp 
enough to take the raw, unsifted meal. Some of the 
men humorously insisted that the meal itself was all 
good enough, but the cobs and beans made it a little 
stale. So most of the meal was put in our pockets till we 
got hungry, and with our ration of meat in our mouths 
to encourage our stomachs we laid down to sleep. 

Next morning we got nothing more to eat. Wood 
was promised every ten minutes, but altogether failed to 
come. The men were inclined to make the best of it. 
Few that I noticed were grieved or fretted. I only re- 
member one old Irishman, from a West Virginia Regi- 
ment, who cried a little for his dear wife's sake — she 
would be so troubled if she knew how hungry he was. 
Much of the forenoon was spent in joking and talking 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



41 



about rich diets; but towards meridian I noticed that a 
good many had been wrought up to the taking of a little 
stall provender. 

At 12 m., we were upon some open cars, and off for 
Lynchburg; and like Tom Moore, by London, were glad 
enough to quit "the dear dusty town." 

Charlottesville lay in the way. This place, for pie- 
venders, is equalled only by York, Pennsylvania. Most 
of the men who saved a penny ftom the thieves at Gor- 
donsville, spent it here. One prisoner had a five dollar- 
greenback, which he gave to an old negro woman for a 
half moon pie. A rebel, seeing this transaction, demanded 
the money of the woman as unlawful currency, and to 
insult us, as defenders of the government, tore it up into 
fragments, and stamped it in the ground. This was in 
sight cf honored Monticello, and the wonder is, that the 
spirit of the mighty dead did not come out of its grave 
and palsy the hand that would so insult the government 
it did so much to establish. 

Lynchburg, nestled as it is at the foot of the Blue 
Ridge, among spouting springs and countless shade trees, 
looked alluring enough as we rode up. The many stee- 
ples from among the trees, stretching high their necks, 
as if to look over the mountain; the historic James, at 
this point scarcely more than a brook, driving along at 
the south, together with the undulating streets, the anti- 
quated architecture, and the little signs of war, created 
in us emotions quite hostile to the facts in our case. 
From the signs of freedom and comfort pervading the 
place, it was hard to believe that we could be in Lynch- 
burg, and yet be captives. But a thorn was in store for 
us here, that goads me unto this day. Here, the officers, 
fourteen of us, and the men, were separated — the men 
taken to the Fair Ground, we to the Lock-up. I| our 
captors had taken us around Lynchburg, I, for one, would 



42 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



have had a much better opinion of Virginia hospitality 
and kindness. The Lock-up was a miserable den. It was 
found in the upper story of a solid brick block, its north 
end facing the street. The place had been fitted and 
used since the war to confine not only criminals against 
the State, but deserters from the army, and at this time 
we found in it every manner of men. They lodged us in 
an apartment 20x35 feet, with but a single 2x3 window 
in the south end, that overlooked the sinks and back- 
yards of the street. To make the room as dark and dis- 
mal as possible, they had made a temporary board parti- 
tion across the north end, thus cutting off a little room 
and shutting out the light and air from that direction. 
There were in addition to our number, in the same room, 
thirty others, of a heterogeneous, motley, mongrel tribe 
of criminals, some of whom, perhaps, had not washed 
their skin or clothes, or had a lung full of fresh air for a 
twelve months. As a matter of course they were all 
covered with vermin — so was the room These wretches 
were never taken from that room for any purpose. 
Everything they received was brought to them, and a 
row of halves of whisky barrels set along the blind end 
of the room to breed death among them. The place was 
a perfect Pandemonium — the inmates were as fearful to 
a decent man as an imp is to a Christian. .No light nor 
ventilation, save what little came through the narrow 
window in the south. No st( ol nor bench, and the floor 
so covered with slime and filth, that we could neither sit 
nor lie down without getting besmeared. To lie like 
hogs in the filth was most revolting to us new arrivals. 
We kept astir till our legs became swollen, and as we 
took the foul, fetid atmosphere into our lungs, it seemed 
like the very shafts of Death. We would crowd around 
the little aperture in the south end for fresh air, but upon 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



43 



the approach of a haggard, pale, dirty, rancid criminal, 
we would disperse like he were a scorpion. 

They kept us six days in this hell. In the meantime, 
we saw a relic of the "Institution.*' It was in the room 
cut off the north end of our apartment, and through 
some holes that had been bored in the temporary parti- 
tion with pocket knives. A slave was brought in three 
times in so many consecutive days, and whipped. He 
had stolen ten postage stamps and a live dollar Confed- 
erate note, for which he was sentenced to receive thirty- 
nine lashes upon his naked body. It was executed thus: 
Three big men, one white and two black, would lead the 
boy to the room — he crying and begging. First, they 
would strip him entirely nude — then set him upon the 
floor and bind his thumbs and great toes together, attach- 
ing a rope thereto ten feet long. Now the white man 
would lay on the naked body with a cowhide, four or five 
licks with all his power; then the two ne.^ro attendants 
would seize hold of the rope and drag the fellow twice 
about the room, he screaming and piteously beseeching 
them. Now, another halt, another four or five lashes; 
another dragging about the room, and so on until thir- 
teen lashes were given ; and the entire round of the floor, 
every inch of it, was marked by the slave's blood. This 
was our six days* experience in Lynchburg, and if we 
left there without the seeds of death in our bodies, and a 
maniac fear of our captors in our hearts, it was not for 
want of effect on the part of the authorities to produce 
such a consummation. 

Danville was our next point. This has been a pleasant 
country town of three thousand inhabitants, and had the 
signs of opulence. Three large cotton factories stand 
within a hundred yards of each other, and the massive 
piles of brick, as residences, bespoke a better past than 
we found present in Danville. We kindled no curiosity 



44 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



by going into the place. The cotton factories alluded to 
had been prison-pens ever since the war began. Dis- 
armed Yankees were as common in this place as dew- 
berries, and as we marched up town in the middle of the 
street, five hundred of us, if a single man turned to look 
at us more curiously than he would at an old blind mule, 
I did not see him. We were locked up in one of the 
factories and fed. 

At this point our guards were changed. It was the 
line of Departments, and we were transferred from the 
Virginia to the North Carolina Department. We gained, 
perhaps, nothing by the change. Both parties had been 
too long engaged in the business of guarding prisoners 
to ;find any novelty in it, or be very kind or even-tem- 
pered. 

Two days afterward we were again on the cars, billed 
for Macon, Georgia, the general rennezvous for Federal 
officers, prisoners of war, and the enlisted men for An- 
dersonville. 

Jamestown, in Guilford county, N. C, is a station on 
the route. Since our experience at Lynchburg, I had 
practiced as little ostentation in my captivity as was con- 
venient. So, when we got to Jamestown, I was sitting 
in the back end of a box car. Our train stopped a few 
minutes on the switch until another train should pass, 
and while there some one came to the car door and asked 
if there were any Indianians aboard. Some one in the 
car answered affirmatively, and then turning to me, said 
that a gentleman (?) wanted to see me at the door. 
Guilford county and Jamestown are household words in 
many Hendricks county families. To me they were as 
familiar as the name of my own native village; besides, 
too, their close relation with many families in this State, 
and the many Friends residing there, had given the place 
same reputation for Union men. This reflection awak- 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



45 



ened in me the thought that I might find a friend, so I 
went to the door. 

A man in gray, with perhaps some lace about the 
neck, and with a canine look, softly accosted me : 

" Are yon from Indiana ? " 

" I am, sir." 

"What part?" 
i "Hendricks county. 5 '' 

" Ah ! why it is from there I had hoped to find a man 
— and what part of Hendricks county ? " 
j "Plainfield, sir." 

"And your name ? " 

U ^ >|S " 

"Is it possible? Why, Fve eaten at your mother's 
house a dozen times ? " 

" Surely," thought I, " I'm in luck. If the fellow has 
accepted my mother's hospitality, he certainly will not 
deny the same to me, under these circumstances." 

He hurriedly asked me questions about families in this 
: county, but more particularly about one that had left 
considerable property in that State before the war. 

" Were the boys in the ' Yankee Army ? " he asked me 
a half dozen times, in as many minutes. 

"Now, wasn't Taylor in the Six Months; or the Ninety 
Days' Service; or the Thirty Days' Service?" 

A little suspicious from the frequency of his questions, 
I asked him why he was so much concerned. 

"Oh," said he, "I just wanted to know." 

"Well," said I, "if Taylor was in the Army, what 
would be the consequence ? " 

" Why, sir, I would confiscate his estate before night — 
| that is what the consequences would be. We've already 
thrown Z.'s into the public crip, and the moment Taylor 
enters the Yankee Army, his goes too." 
i He proved to be a perfect land-shark, or its equivalent 



46 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



• — a tithing officer, whose duty it was to go about from 
house to house — as well to the poor as to the rich — with 
a squad of soldiers, and take by force, if necessary, one- 
tenth part of everything produced, for the government. 
The poor widow and the impotent was not even spared; 
but her tenth row of corn must be counted and her tenth 
row of potatoes, her tenth pound of butter, her tenth 
pound of yarn, her tenth yard of linsey, and her tenth of 
everything must be handed over to the brave officer, who 
was not " afraid " to punish her if she refused. This was 
the office of the man who "had eaten at my mother's 
house a dozen times," and was now eating at the lives of 
widows and orphans, and grew rich enough in the busi- 
ness to drive a nourishing hotel in Greensboro after the 
war. This scoundrel's name was, for short, Bill Reese. 
He not only had a mean object in view in questioning me, 
but tried to take the dishonest advantage of leading me 
into familiarity by speaking of my mother's hospitality, 
(which, by the way, I am glad to state, was all a fabrica- 
tion ; or, rather, he had eaten frequently at my " mother's 
house" in 1862, but not from my mother's table, but from 
the bounty of those whom he was just then seeking to 
injure). To prove himself more fully a consummate vil- 
lain, as the cars moved off he insolently pushed away an 
old woman, who rushed up to give us something to eat. 
He has, however, now fully accounted at the bar of God, 
and should be forgiven in the minds of men. 

On we went, via Salisbury, Charlotte, Columbia, and 
Augusta; it was at the latter place where we saw more 
signs of loyalty than we had before seen in the South. 
Here a family of New Jersey folks met us at the depot, 
where we stopped for an hour, and with a few others, 
exerted themselves to get us up a "square" meal. And 
they met with some success. The soft, white bread, sand- 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



47 



wiches with boiled -bam, butter, boiled eggs, and dew- 
berry pies, did seem most delicious indeed. 

We arrived at Macon about tbe lOtb of June. Upon 
entering tbe suburbs of tbe town, tbe train stopped and 
put off tbe fourteen officers; tben moved off to Ander- 
sonville with tbe enlisted men. To tbe left of tbe rail- 
road, 300 or 400 yards, an ominous inclosure at once 
attracted our attention. The fence or wall, raised six- 
teen feet bigb, constructed very closely of heavy upright 
boards, and surmounted by a causeway, with armed men 
thereon at every twenty paces, sluggishly walking to and 
fro. Just before us was the gate, spanned from post to 
post by a broad, towering arch, showing in its curve, in 
huge black letters — black as tbe principle that wrote 
them there — "Camp Oglethorpe." This gate was neither 
brass nor iron, but was a ponderous affair, and before us 
had creaked behind thirteen hundred Federal officers, 
prisoners of war. Without command, we started for the 
pen, for we knew that it was our present destiny, and 
would be driven if we went not voluntarily ; besides, not- 
withstanding it was a lock-up, we were right anxious to 
get inside, as well to see our friends we expected there, 
as to get rid of such immediate contact with tbe rebels. 
We were conducted first to the office of the prison, which 
stood but a few feet from the gate, and there halted and 
detained until preparations could be made within for an- 
other examination. It seems clear to me that during the 
last years of the war, the rebels were determined that no 
prisoner should retain any valuable thing; not even his 
life, if they could devise the slightest shadow of justifi- 
cation for taking it. 

As thoroughly as they stripped us at Gordonsville, 
we were yet to be subjected to a more severe scru- 
tiny at Macon. At Gordonsville, after search, we were 
permitted to go back into our company, and by slipping 



48 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



from one to the other, managed to save a few things ; 
but at Macon, as fast as robbed, we were sent into the 
pen. 

Everything being ready, we were called by turns inside. 
This time they even made us strip our vests and pants, 
and so ravenous were they for greenbacks, that every 
seam and double of our garments were examined with 
the greatest care. The few dollars that had been con- 
cealed up to this point, were turned out here, and for 
which the man in the sash executed and delivered a re- 
ceipt with the utmost suavity ; all the time, too, swearing 
about the Gorclonsville Major stealing from us; that that 
was properly his duty, and nobody's else. These receipts 
were too much of a mockery for Captain Todd, of the 
8th lSTew Jersey, who at once tore his up in the face of 
the giver. 

As we were examined and recorded, we were sent 
through the gate. Captain Eagan and Lieutenant Brown 
were the first to enter. And now followed something 
that I could not then understand ; I should have had less 
trouble in the world if I had. 

Immediately after the big gate slammed, some one in- 
side shouted at the top of his voice, "F-r-e-s-h fish I 
F-r-e-s-h fish!" which was caught up all over the pen, 
and re-echoed by perhaps five hundred men. " F-r e-s-h 
fish ! F-r-e-s-h fish I" still resounded within, and we could 
hear what seemed to be, and what really was, a thousand 
men rushing headlong to the gate, shouting those mys- 
terious words. I, for one, did not like to hear it. It 
sounded to me like a very queer way to receive a friend 
in distress. So I decided that I would not longer fret to 
get in there. 

" What's all that confusion in there mean, guard?" 
said a young Lieutenant at my side. 

""Why, those are the old Libbyites, who have become 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



49 



so demoralized and starved that they kill and eat every 
fresh man that is put among them," replied the guard/' 
earnestly. 

"No, they don't," most piteously rejoined rny friend. 

"I'll he d d if they don't," emphatically retorted 

the rebel. 

And what we could hear from the inside was by no 
means calculated to contradict this remark. Such eiacu- 
lations as "Don't kill him;" "Don't cut his throat with 
that case-knife;" "Oh, let him say his prayers;" 41 Oh, 
men, have some mercy — let his blanket alone;" " Don't 
take his coat;" "His boots are mine;" "His haveisaofc 
is mine." Louder, "Put him on a stump," etc., etc., fell 
like hot water on our ears. We had less faith in going 
into that den than Daniel had in going into the lion's. 

But our turn came, and with it we thought oui ends. 
Lieutenant Smith Culver and myself were led to the 
gate together. We looked volumes at each other as the 
guard pounded the boards with the but of his gun The 
bolt glided back, the hinges creaked, the gate swung open, 
and then — there appeared before us a sea ot gh< stly, 
grizzly, dirty, haggard faces, writhing and seething, this 
way and that way. As we stepped in the noi>< £ the 
crowd within hushed. We were frightened m out 
of our wits. In we went — the writer in the re - -th'e 
Dead Line was passed, and sooner than I can tel , my 
comrade was swallowed up in the mystic mass re- 
tiring like a thunderbolt. came down upon my s] Vider, 
my blanket was snatched away. I was seize v the 
arm, jerked headlong to one side, and somebod i low 
voice, said, "For God's sake, follow me!" I t the 
best I could, which was by no means a failure • ran 
like a scared dog, and I, like his shadow — a I the 
crowd, across the pen, through the barracks, ov unks, 
4 



60 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



we went till we had reached nearly the other side of the 
prison, when, half crazy, I exclaimed : 

"Chis! what's the matter?" 

" Nothing, if you will follow me." 

I followed into an old building on the east side of the 
prison, and, sitting down with my boon companion, Chis- 
man, upon the sill, he told me how it was. But I learned 
it better by experience than he taught me. It all grew 
out of a mania for news. The starving of the mind is as 
infuriating as the starving of the body. Those who have 
never been prisoners will little appreciate it. Penned up 
in the middle of the enemy's country, active operations 
going on in the armies, victories being Won or lost, the 
rebellion failing or gaining, friends being killed or pro- 
moted; and not a letter or newspaper — not a sentence or 
a syllable to give the tidings. The anxiety for news was 
almost distracting at times, for the dearth was not of a 
day nor a week, but of a month. The only reliable in- 
formation that came to the prison at all, was brought 
there by the recent captures, and it is for this reason 
alone that such commotion arose among them when a 
new man arrived. The phrase "fresh fish" was a dis- 
tinctive term used to distinguish the old prisoners — the 
Libbyites, who were called " salt fish " — from the recent 
captures. The cry was always raised whenever there was 
a new arrival; and then everybody ran to see who it was, 
and hear the news. The crowding was beyond descrip- 
tion. As many as could possibly hear a word, would 
edge themselves about the speaker, and those who could 
not hear, being vexed and mischievous, would sing out 
such remarks as the above, to scare the fellow and make 
him remember his initiation into prison. I have often, 
too, seen men gather themselves, a dozen or two together, 
a tew steps from one of these knots of listeners, and in 
concert go against them with a rush — suddenly shoving 



SEVEN MOJTTHS A PRISONER. 



51 



them, and many times getting the object of their interest 
under foot, and sometimes hurt. This was what was 
known among us as a " raid." 

The first day in prison is the hardest of one's life. 

Chisman, learning from those of my party who went 
in first, that I was at the gate, took a position and saved 
me from the ordeal required of the others. 

This was my debut into a prison pen ; and if I live to 
forget it, I shall either be crazy, or an old man. 

Among the thirteen hundred prisoners I found many 
friends — three of whom were from Hendricks county. 
These last were all " salt fish," having been prisoners 
about two years — most of the time in Libby. 

If Captain Milt. Russell's wife had seen her husband, 
with his long hair and beard standing, or hanging a 
"little" miscellaneously about his head and face, the 
points of which, from the direct rays of a Southern sun,, 
were colored like the surface of a black sheep's wool in 
June ; his skin, from cooking in the sun and over pine^ 
knots, the complexion of a smoked ham ; his pants and* 
jacket composed of three qualities of cloth, viz., blanket^ 
Yankee blue and rebel gray; his hat wholly of Yankee 
overcoat ; his shoes, ditto ; strolling among the prisoners,, 
begging for a chew of tobacco, or a pipe full — she would,, 
in my opinion, have had scruples about her matrimonial 
judgment. She would, however, have felt better toward 
him had she known of but half the times he spoke of 
her and Sella. 

There, too, was Lieutenant Thomas Dooley. He had 
been a prisoner long enough to grow a little morose, and 
was big enough, I reckon, to get the lion's share of food, 
for really his physical state contradicted the old starva- 
tion story of Libby. 

Lieutenant Adair looked by odds the most forlorn of' 
the three. His health had. been bad^ his patience worse,. 



52 



SEVEN MONTHS A PMSONEK. 



and had it not been for the encouragement of his friends, 
I fear he would have gone to his "rest" in the South. 

There were, also, besides Chisman, my Colonel and 
Mitchell, the " man on the roan horse," and many others 
of my acquaintance. They all seemed " glad " to see me. 

The prison pen at Macon was as comfortable as any I 
was at. It was located east of the city, on an inclined 
plain, sandy, and a small stream of water running through 
the south end, and had formerly been used as county fair 
grounds. There were probably three acres inclosed, in 
the center of which stood a large, one-story frame build- 
ing, which had been the floral hall of the show, but was 
now the bed-room of two hundred men. We had shel- 
ter for the most # part here ; besides, some boards were 
given us for bunks. The water we never complained of, 
nor the wood, for they were reasonably plenty and rea- 
sonably good. But the rations were inexcusable. So 
much has been said and written already about what pris- 
oners get to eat in the South, that I would not be excused 
in repeating it he; e, but I do not wish my reticence con- 
strued into disaffirming anything that has been told. It 
would be hard, indeed, to magnify the facts in the case. 
But at no other place in the South did I feel the teeth of 
hunger so keenly as at Macon. This much only will I 
say, that my mess ot fo.ur could make but two meals per 
day, consisting of a pone of bread, made up of water and 
two pints of unsifted meal. A little rancid bacon was 
given us occasionally, and a few peas, say enough for a 
dinner, once a week. The only fights I saw in prison, 
grew out of the dividing of rations, and they were not 
unfrequent. 

I am ashamed to tell how we did in my mess, but will, 
at a venture. "We alternated in cooking, and when the 
pone was done the cook would cut it into four parts, as 
nearly equal as possible, then take choice, and leave the 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



53 



others to take theirs according to priority. By this 
method the cook always knew when his turn came. If 
there were peas to cook, plenty of water was added, and 
by the time we got the hot water drank off', the greediest 
eaters were full, and left the peas to the more moderate. 
This fact generally preserved an equilibrium in our soup 
dinners. To preserve order, the prisoners were organized 
into squads of one hundred, with a nominal Captain and 
Orderly Sergeant; this one hundred subdivided into 
squads of twenty, with a Commissary Sergeant; and 
then again subdivided into messes of four. By this means 
the rations and wood came first to the one hundred, then 
to the twenty, and then to the four. 

The authorities at Macon called the roll of the prison- 
ers in this wise: The Officer of the Day would come in 
each morning, with twenty guards, and deploy them 
'across the north end of the pen; then all begin whoop- 
ing and hallooing and swearing, to drive us to the south 
end. This being accomplished, some interval between 
the guards was designated as the place for count, which 
was effected by us returning, one by one, through that 
interval into the body of the inclosure. 

Tunneling was a big business here. There were three 
of them under way at one time, and came near being 
successful. One was ready to be opened up the last of 
June, but to accommodate the managers of the other 
two, was delayed to the night of the 3d of July, when 
the others would be ready — the three affording capacity 
to let every prisoner out by midnight — and thus have an 
interesting time in Georgia on the 4th of July. But the 
treachery of an Illinois Captain revealed the whole 
scheme, and the rebels came in on the morning of the 
8d, and deliberately took possession of the holes, without 
a guide. It is said that the Captain was promised a spe- 
cial exchange, and likely got it, for after the fact was 



54 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



learned by us, through a negro, the traitor was taken out- 
side, and never appeared among us any more. 

The manner of making those subterranean avenues 
was simple but slow. The beginning of each, at Macon, 
was under a bunk built a few inches from the ground. 
As soon as dark came, the boards composing the bunk 
were laid aside, and the work began. First, a hole three 
feet in diameter was sunk four feet perpendicularly into 
the ground ; then from the bottom of this hole, the tun- 
nel proper would begin, at right angles, two and a half 
feet in diameter, and pass horizontally along to the place 
of exit. The digging was mostly done with knives, but 
a spade or two figured in the business at Macon. The 
dirt was taken out in sacks, tied to the middle of a rope, 
which was twice as long as the hole, fastened to the dig- 
ger's leg, by which, when he had dug up as much as a 
sack full of dirt, he would draw the sack in, fill it up, 
jerk his rope, and the man at the mouth would draw it 
out and empty it into another sack, or hat, or blanket, or 
whatever was available. The off-borer would then start, 
throwing a handfuil occasionally like wheat, carrying a 
little to the spring, where there had been recent digging, 
.a little to the well with fresh dirt laying about; but the 
most general deposit was under the old Floral Hall. At 
the approach of daylight business would be suspended, 
the hole covered up, the bunk replaced, and two men 
probably asleep on it when the rebels came in for their 
( count. 

To give an example of the inhumanity of our treat- 
ment at Macon, may not be amiss. The spring was within 
itwenty feet of the dead lin^ and it was no violation of 
orders to go to it at any time of the day or night, A 
German Captain of the 45th New York, on the 17th of 
June, at dusk, went to the spring for water, and was just 
[beginning his return, when the guard nearest the point* 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



55 



without saying a word, or having a .word said to him, 
coolly shot him through the body, from which he died in 
an hour afterwards. 

A written appeal to the authorities to investigate the 
matter, was answered by promoting the homicide to be 
sergeant, and giving him a thirty day's furlough. The 
reward was freely circulated among us, under pretense of 
the officer having crossed the dead line — to be an exam- 
ple of reward to vigilant sentinels, and a caution to indis- 
creet prisoners. 

Notwithstanding the failure of our tunnels, the Fourth 
of July was by no means forgotten by the prisoners. 
Captain Todd, of the 8th New Jersey, somehow had man- 
aged to smuggle into prison a little 6x10 Union flag. 
- ' Immediately after roll call, the " magic little rag " was 
unfurled to the breeze, and hoisted on a staff. In an in- 
stant the prison was in an uproar ; every man's heart was 
shocked as if by a current of electricity. One poor crea- 
ture, who had crawled about on his hands and knees for 
a month, with scurvy, leaped to his feet, and shouted at 
the top of his voice, "Hurrah for the Union!" Others, 
weighed down with grief since the moment of their in- 
carceration, shook off their loads and cried out, " Three 
cheers for the Red, White and Blue." The excitement 
was wonderful. Two or three hundred men gathered 
around the little flag and marched about the pen, making 
the wall of the prison reverberate the echoes of the in- 
spiring song of "Rally Round the Flag, Boys." Then 
they marched into the Floral Hall for speaking. A rough 
structure by one of the pillars of the building, called a 
table, was used as a rostrum, from which short speeches 
were made till late in the*afternoon. And they were, 
too, of the most patriotic and radical order, interspersed 
always with some national air, lying bj the entire com- 
pany. 



56 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



The rebels got a little troubled ove^this, and twice sent 
in a corporal's guard and demanded the flag ; but these 
were only laughed at, and sent away empty. A third 
time the Officer of the Day came in with a squad of men 
and bore orders from the Commandant of the prison, 
"that that flag must be surrendered, peaceably or forci- 
bly." Col. Thorp, 1st New York Dragoons, was speak- 
ing at the time, and turning to the officer, said — 

"Lieutenant, be pleased to say to Captain Gibbs that 
the flag we are rejoicing under is the property of the 
prisoneis, and that it will not be surrendered peaceably, 
and that the moment he attempts force, twenty minutes 
afterwards we will be burning and sacking the city of 
Macon." [Cries of "That's it," "Who'll do it?" "NoVs 
the time." 

The guard stood amazed only a moment, for when they 
heard such ejaculations from the crowd as "Kill the d — d 
rebels:" "Take their guns from them;" "Rally to the 
gate,'" they left the pen in a hurry, and it was the last 
time they ever demanded our flag, though its display was 
an every day occurrence afterwards. 

Colonel Thorpe had the honorary command inside the 
prison, but his retort to the rebel officer of the day cost 
him his position the same evening, as will be seen by the 
following order : 



I. Lieutenant Colonel Thorp is relieved from duty as 
Senior Officer of Prisons for a violation of prison rules, 
and Lieutenant Colonel McCrary will again assume that 
position. 

II. The same order and quiet will be observed on this 
day as on any other. 




C. S. Military Prison, - Macon, Ga., 
July 4, 1864. 



SEV1-N MONTHS A PRISON EE. 



57 



III. A disregard of this order may subject offenders 
to unpleasant consequences. 

George C. Gibbs, 

Captain Commanding. 

My memoranda shows that on the 20th of July, while 
I was kneading dough in a camp kettle, I heard the cry 
of " fresh tish" at the gate. At this date I was "one of 
'em,'' and without washing my hands or a moment's de- 
lay, I was off to the gate, hut not so< n enough to get a 
place near the entrance through the d< ■ line. But from 
the spot I obtained I could see the three strangers as 
they came through the gate, and see that the youngest 
of them was my old comrade, Shelton, whom I left 
in the rebel field hospital, near the Wilderness. He 
limped a little yet, but his wound was nearly healed. 

But right here let us stop and hunt up Ohishian. He 
is to be closely connected with us through the rest of this 
sketch, and it may be of interest to the reader to know 
who he was, and what he was. I wisl >u all knew him 
as I do — then you would have more interest in my story. 
He was to me more than to most men, because we had 
slept together for nearly two years, doing duty the while 
as "Western men" on a "Down East" staff. Our rela- 
tion had been the most intimate, and, as a matter of 
course, when we met at Macon we paired, perhaps a lit- 
tle selfishly, too. Chisman is a rare man — one of ten 
thousand — a companion for everybody ; thirty years old, 
blue eyes, light hair, sandy beard, five feet ten inches 
high, and built like a prince. He was a great wag, con- 
versed well, was quick in repartee, sung a good song, and 
told a most ' excellent story. He was famous in all his 
corps for these qualities. In the army, life seemed to him 
more a jest than earnest. He felt no care, had no trou- 
ble; and when his appetite was quiet, so was his mind. 



58 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



"Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof," was his 
motto; and "live well, live jolly/' his practice. His heart 
was as big as a mountain, and the consequence was, had 
always a host of friends about him. He was also lucky. 
As a Mason, of considerable degrees, he had fortunately 
found a brother, both at Gordonsville and Macon, and 
was admitted into prison with a good gum overcoat and 
valuable gold watch. This coat he sold at Macon, to a 
rebel officer, for $100; the watch at Savannah, for §1,200, 
rebel money. Another one of Chisman's rare qualities 
is, that he lacks selfishness — he has not enough of it for 
self protection; so in prison, among so many needy 
friends, it was found necessary, in order to preserve any 
of his funds, that I be made hi6 banker, which office I 
accepted, and "faithfully" accounted to my patron for a 
full half of his deposits. 

Immediately upon our meeting at Macon, and the sale 
of the overcoat, we set ourselves about preparing " for 
something to turn up." With a $5 Confederate note we 
bought a pint of salt, and sewed it up in a little sack, at 
both ends, so that we would not use it; also, with another 
similar note we bought matches — -just five bunches — and 
sewed them up likewise ; then, with another, a quantity 
of needles and thread was procured, and for the most 
part sewed ditto; the three necessaries then sewed up 
together in an oil-cloth sack, and laid carefully away. 
With these precautions, if an opportunity ever offered 
for escape, we would not be prevented for want of pre- 
paration. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



59 



CHAPTER IV. 

LIEUTENANT CHI8MAN OFF FROM MACON GENERAL STONE- 

MAN'S RAID AT SAVANNAH THE CURIOUS POPULACE DRAY- 
TON STREET CHISMAN AND THE REBEL GIRL THE PRISON 

MAJOR HILL AND HIS GUARDS HOW THEY TREATED US 

FROM SAVANNAH TO CHARLESTON THE THIRTEENTH OF 

SEPTEMBER CHARLESTON JAIL YARD THE BOMBARDMENT 

UNDER FIRE OF OUR OWN GUNS THE DESOLATION OF THE 

CIXY YELLOW FEVER IN OUR CAMP CONSTERNATION OF 

OUR GUARDS SENT TO COLUMBIA INTENSE SUFFERING FROM 

THIRST THE REREL REFUGEES THE CADETS CAMP SOR- 
GHUM AMUSEMENTS RATIONS AN OFFICER TORN TO PIECES 

BY DOGS THE FINAL ESCAPE. 

During the latter part of July General Stoneman got 
to raiding around Macon, and begat fear in the hearts of 
our keepers, whereupon they decided to send us further 
south. On the 27th of July five squads, of one hundred 
each, were filed out of the prison pen and put upon the 
cars for Charleston. Two days afterward another five 
squads were called for, and this time I was in the count. 
We were sent to Savannah, where we arrived on the af- 
ternoon of the 30th. As we were the first Yankees, 
armed or disarmed, ever seen in the city, a great curiosity 
was manifested by the citizens to see us. The afternoon 
was very fair, and the sea breezes had begun to shake the 
boughs of the live oaks and moss-grown pines, as we rode 
in and diesmbarked on Liberty street. Everybody was 
out to see the Yankees. Drayton street, through which 
we had to pass, was literally walled, on either side, with 
old men, women, and children, of all colors. I submit 
that we were not in a fine, or even modest condition for 
a public presentation; but since we had no will in the 
matter, we felt no responsibility for our appearance. The 



60 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



weather was very warm ; besides, there were many men 
in the party who had been prisoners two years, and had 
no better clothes. Some had on nothing but pants ; some, 
nothing but a shirt ; others, a little of both ; unshaven, 
hair untrimmed, bare headed, bare footed, dirty, and with 
kettles, skillets, meal sacks, rice bags r or bundles of old 
clothes in our hands; and this was the style we expected 
and did present to the aristocratic citizens of Savannah. 
We were formed in four ranks, and received by a fancy 
guard, and started for the avenue. But the crowd was 
so eager, it was found necessary to halt us until the guard 
and police could clear the street to the sidewalks. This 
being accomplished, they led us into the guantlet of cu- 
riosity, and as we progressed, a hundred little boys ran 
after us, hallooing and shouting, like they would follow 
an elephant through our streets. Rebel bunting and 
mottoes were everywhere. On poles and ropes, in the 
windows and hands of the women and children. A nong 
the many, there was one young woman who, perhaps, 
had lost a lover by the Yankees, and wanted to show her 
hate ; else it was love of ostentation that brought the 
blush to her cheek before the Yankees passed. She was 
a luscious creature ; painted and fixed up like a candy 
monkey, and stood at the street crossing, in the' front rank, 
leaning forward, flaunting her "bonnie blue flag" in our 
faces, with a satanic sneer. The indomitable Chisman 
came up, swinging an old blanket in one hand and a bag 
of meal in the other, and seeing the enthusiasm of the 
Miss could but remember the seedy condition of his pants, 
and turning himself rather unfashionably about, remarked 
with much gravity : 

" Miss, if you've got time, I wish you would tack a rag 
on here," at the same time pointing to a place that evi- 
dently needed something of the sort. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



61 



We were shut up in the United States Marine Hospital 
grounds. The 1st Georgia Volunteers took charge of us. 
This was the oldest regiment belonging to the State, hav- 
ing been organized and armed in January, 1861. They 
had been at the front since the beginning, and becoming 
almost decimated, were sent home to rest and recruit. 

Major, afterward Colonel, Hill took command of the 
prison ; and I am compelled to say that he and his officers 
and men, generally, were gentlemen, if such are found 
among rebels; or at least appeared to be in contrast with 
the Macon authorities. These were old soldiers, and 
knew a soldier's lot and how to sympathize with him. 
Hill enforced strict discipline in the prison, but it was as 
much to our comfort and convenience, as to his. He gave 
us tents, and boards for bunks ; also, plenty of rations — 
that is of meat, meal, and rice, the two latter in a surplus, 
which he bought from us at Government rates, paying in 
onions and potatoes.- Besides, he furnished us with facil- 
ities for cooking — kettles, pans, and brick for Dutch 
ovens. 

Qur treatment at Savannah was as reasonable as could 
be expected, and during our six weeks' stay, not a single 
prisoner escaped. 

The spirit of retaliation was up at this time between 
the two contending forces. Five hundred Federal officers 
were already under fire of our own guns at Charleston, 
and it was hither we were sent on the 13th day of Sep- 
tember. There is no date in all the calendar of time that 
has been by me so much thought of, and so much hoped 
for, as the 13th day of September, 1864. No other date 
has ever been, nor perhaps will ever be, the subject of so 
many doubts, and so many happy anticipations ; for it 
was the date that terminated my three years enlistment 
as a soldier — it was the date that my regiment was to 
leave the wall of rebel steel for the embraces of their 



62 SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 

friends at home. With these reflections to discourage us» 
Chisman and I, members of the same regiment, stepped 
sadly into an old cattle car, for Charleston, the very foun- 
tain of the flood of treason that had engulphed the entire 
South. 

The night of the 13th we slept in the Charleston jail 
yard, and watched with delight the red streaks that fol- 
lowed our two hundred pound shells as they were shot 
forth from Batteries Gregg and Wagner, every fifteen 
minutes, and came screaming over our heads to a full 
fourth of a mile beyond. 

This was a part of the famous siege of Charleston ; this 
was in the late war at least one feature of uncivilized war- 
fare — that of placing prisoners under fire of their own 
guns. Just across the bay, on Morris Island, between the 
two batteries above mentioned, was an uncovered stock- 
ade, in which were confined a thousand rebel officers, to 
be torn to death by their own brothers and fathers if their 
shell varied a little from its aim. The thousand Federal 
officers in the city were scattered about " as the exigencies 
of the service required." I must say, to the credit of 
General Foster, the Federal commander on Morris Island, 
that he seemed excellently well informed in the various 
changes of our localities. The Charleston papers com- I 
plained bitterly of the police and City Guard, because | 
they could make no explanation of the mysterious rockets 
that could be seen almost nightly, in different parts of the 
city, and more especially immediately after the removal 
of a party of Yankees. 

General Foster perhaps could have given a better ex- 
planation than any policeman or guard in the city, for if 
a party of prisoners were removed into a locality directly 
under the scourge, perchance not another shell would 
come near ; and in a few hours afterward, open up with 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 63 

terrible effect in the very place they had left. One ex- 
ample : Eighty-six of us were taken from the jail yard to 
the private residence of Colonel 0' Conner, on Broad 
street* and while there, nearly two weeks, not a shell struck 
nearer than an eighth of a mile. A party of rebel officers 
for convenience and safety, took quarters within a hun- 
dred yards of us. We were removed about noon — the 
rebels remaining, and that night, while safety was thought 
to be brooding over them, a two hundred pound shell 
from Foster's guns came crashing through the house, 
killing the provost marshal and a captain instantly, and 
badly wounding a lieutanant. During our confinement 
there, of nearly three months, the only casualty among 
us was one man slightly wounded in the hand. 

At Charleston I was more than ever convinced that 
"the way of the transgressor is hard;" that retributive 
justice, though sometimes slow of foot, is sure, sooner or 
later, to overtake us all. Charleston, in 1860, was the 
Athens of the South ; not only renowned for its learned 
and great men, but it might safely be termed the parent 
of southern ideas, and southern politics, and southern 
institutions. It was a city rich, aristocratic, licentious and 
arrogant. In 1864 it was the Babylon of the South, con- 
demned and desolated. The hand of God had written ot 
wicked Charleston: "And their houses shall be full of 
doleful creatures, and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs 
shall dance there." 

The celebrated Mills House, where in 1860 the elite of 
southern society crowded the halls and parlors, was, in 
1864, the barracks of a ragged garrison. And Meering 
street where, in 1860, the wealthy slaveocrats drove their 
gorgeous turnouts, the buzzard munched his carrion in 
1864. 

The great fire of 1861, that laid waste its fifteen squares, 
with the almost daily fires occurring during a two years' 



64 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



siege, had utterly destroyed much of the city, and it was 
at this time nearly deserted, save by the garrison, and a 
few pauper whites and negroes. 

The yellow fever broke out among us at Charleston. 
This is the king of terrors to the southern people, and as 
he took hold on us with such determined fatality, they 
became much alarmed. It was among us tive days in 
the city, and my recollection is, that out of thirty cases 
among the prisoners, not one recovered. The rebels 
shunned us as they would an infected house^ refusing to 
come near only when their duty compelled them. It was 
with the greatest difficulty that the Post Commander 
could keep guards about us; and one fellow that I re- 
member, who was driven to his post, was in a few mo- 
ments seized wit) i spasms, and carried away in terrorem. 
I verily believe, that had they been required to guard us 
forty-eight hours more in the city, we would have been 
abandoned. But the Commander, Jones, on the 4th day 
of October, succeeded in getting some cars, and away we 
went to Columbia, South Carolina^ without letter or des- 
patch, and fell upon that high place of treason, like a 
thunderbolt, and had we been all armed and commanded 
by Sheridan, we would hardly have surprised them more. 
The Provost Marshal, who seemed to be a pretty clever 
kind of a rebel, tretted and complained a guod deal, in- 
sisting that it was an imposition to so suddenly send 
fifteen hundred prisoners upon ^him, without even a 
chicken coop or a dozen men at is command. He at 
first refused to receipt Cooper, the Charlestonian, for the 
prisoners, but after some altercations and some compro- 
mise, the matter was fixed up in such a way that Cooper 
should stay with his men and take charge of us until 
some arrangements could be made. 

We were kept on the cars all night, and suffered most 
intensely from thirst. The door before, at noon, we were 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



65 



crowded, or more properly jammed, seventy men into a 
dirty cattle car, with camp kettles, coffee pots, greasy 
skillets, meal sacks, rice bags, old clothes, and such other 
appendages as are found with prisoners of war, at Char- 
leston, on a scorching hot day, and not twenty men of 
the six hundred tasted water till six o'clock the following 
morning. At this hour we were taken from the cars and 
herded near the railroad like a drove of cattle, and our 
disembarkation was attended with about the same noise 
and confusion. Men were frantic with thirst. Some 
supplicating, some cursing, some threatening, made a din 
scarcely surpassed since Moses smote the rock in the 
wilderness, and the rebels took no steps to relieve us — 
seemed pleased to see it. Our suffering, however, was 
not long to endure, for Heaven, in its mercy, soon opened 
up a copious fountain, which drenched us without as well 
as within. 

Here, as well as everywhere in the South, we could 
see the results of the rebellion. One side of our corral 
was marked by a half dozen or more box cars, which, 
becoming useless to the railroad, had been set aside . 
Each one of these old cars was tenanted by a family of 
refugees, most, if not all of whom, had seen better days 
no longer than two years before. The third car from the 
left attracted considerable attention by the plaintive re- 
marks of one of its female occupants. She was a lady of 
intelligence, and free to talk. Her story was about this : 

In 1862 she and her mother were living at home with 
her father and brother, in luxuriant ease, in the city of 
Nashville. They had a fine place on one of the fashion- 
able streets of the city, and had never known what it was 
to want for anything. But upon the fall of Fort Don el- 
son they, with many other families, took fright and fled 
South, to escape the dreaded Yankees, taking with them 
5 



66 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONEK. 



nothing but their wardrobes, as they expected to be able 
to return in safety in a month or two. But two long 
years had now elapsed, and they were still away, having 
in the time been tossed about from place to place by 
every Yankee gale. Her father and brother had both . 
been forced into the rebel army, and her brother killed. 
All their friends South had become tired, and cast them 
off, and now they were driven to the embarrassing ex- \ 
tremity of living in an old condemned box car, depend- i 
ing for bread upon the cold charities of an impoverished 1 
public. 

Immediately upon our arrival at Columbia, a telegram j 
was sent to Hillsboro for a company of Cadets, in school I 
there, and in the afternoon of the same day about forty I 
arrived and relieved the old Charlestonian Guard that I 
was over us. These boys, having been chosen from all 5 
parts of the Confederacy to be trained for heroes, now j 
in their Freshman year, more than appreciated their im- I 
portance, or in other words had the " big head," as the i 
common soldiers thought, for they hated them worse j 
than the Yankees. They came down in their suits of t 
fine gray cloth, fitted by the tailor, paper collars, blacked j 
boots, and white gloves, not only to guard Yankee pris- i 
oners, but to teach the common soldiers a touch of sci- 
ence in the profession. They seemed to enjoy the recrea- 
tion mightily, till the rain came on again in the evening, 
and collapsed their collars as well as their spirits; then 
they got mad at everything and everybody. One little 
fiend got so voracious for Yankee blood, so eager for a 
loyal life upon which to climb into fame, that he took 
two full steps from his post to drive his bayonet through 1 
the body of Lieutenant Clark, who was negotiating with 
a negro woman for a corn pone. Not even a reprimand > 
for this wanton murder ever came to the knowledge oi 
the prisoners. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



67 



No suitable inclosure could be found for us in Colum- 
)ia, and we were marched across the Broad River, two 
biles south of the city, to an old barren field that had 
jeen abandoned fifteen years, and was now sparsely over- 
grown with pine bushes from ten to fifteen feet high. 
These bushes were our only wood supply, and with a few 
ixceptions the second day saw their ashes scattered to the 
vinds. This camp was large enough — probably six acres 
n all. There was no stockade, no fence, no water but 
branch, no shelter- — not even for the sick, the first ten 
lays. The well men never had any, only what they con- 
trived with their blankets, etc. Around us here was a 
•ow of pins, standing fifty feet apart, and from twelve to 
ifteen inches high. The line marked by these pins was 
;he famous dead line, which the prisoner passed at the 
beril of his lite. Outside of this line, thirty feet, was the 
^uard line, maintained by sentinels, fifteen steps apart. 
■ Such was Camp Sorghum, at Columbia, where the 
rebels reduced us to a condition as nearly to the level of 
yeasts as was possible for them to do. I would not wrong 
3-hem much if I were to say that they did not give ns 
finything here but air, branch water and room, but I will 
•lo them full justice and add, that they did also give us 
•jach, daily, a pint of unsifted corn meal, mixed with 
oeans and cobs pulverized, and lots of sorghum molasses. 

I am faithful to the fact when I say that during the 
nonth I staid with them at Columbia, they did not give 
(is one board or tent for shelter, nor one ounce of meat 
pr bread, and if I will except a half pound of flour they 
i^ave us each two or three times, and a couple of spoon- 
mis of salt as often, then with the meal and molasses I 
iaave told it all. Not even a pan or a skillet, or a bucket, 
for a kettle in which to save our rations or cook them ; 
m& had it not been that a few of these articles were clan- 
lestinely carried away from other prisons, and procured 



68 SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 

With private means, it is hard to imagine how we woul ! 
have got along. As it was, if we put in the count fk 
rocks, pieces of tin, scraps of old iron, etc., we had 
cooking utensil to about every twenty-five men. Th" 
most valuable of any I saw in use was a slab of cast iroi 4 
two by three feet, that would turn off at single bakin 1 
cakes enough for six men. This thing was kept in ui 
fire nearly all the time, and accommodated more than 
hundred men. Meal for five, and once for nine days, wi 
issued to us at one time, and if it rained the next da 
we had our dough kneaded for four days to come, and 
it was sour for the three last days it was only our misfo: 
tune. We received our meal any way we could. Son: 
were driven to the extreme of cutting off their pant leg 
Others, more fortunate, got along by tearing the linin 
from their coat sleeves, or by appropriating a spare ga 
ment; anything and everything that could be used w; 
brought out on ration day. 

To show how jealous those Southerners are of Yai 
kees and Yankee ingenuity, I will mention that soon aft : 
our location at Columbia, some prisoners got to diggirf; 
and scraping away in a bank near tbe branch, claimic 
that they had found a gold mine. The rebels, immedi. 
ately upon hearing the report, contracted the guard lir 
so as to leave the gold mine outside. 

Notwithstanding all the efforts of our captors to exte 
minate us and make us miserable — notwithstanding i ' 
our destitution and exposure, good feeling prevailed ge: 
erally among the prisoners I think more than at ar 
other place — a more general disposition to be jolly, ai 
a determination to hold out against the designs of o L 
captors. 

The sorghum molasses that was given us in such abu 
dance was the source of much merriment. Men wou j 
reduce great kettles full of it to wax; then take it ai 



SEYEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



69 



ike wax figures of every conceivable shape; make it 
lo balls and throw it at the guards after dark; make 
d hang effigies of rebel celebrities, and such like. And 
,mes of all kinds were resorted to — some of science and 
ill, others of the most foolish sort. One I will men- 
n, that was as silly as it was full of fun. We called it 
izz. It went thus : 

^ometimes as many as a hundred men would gather 
Bmselves into a circle, set a "dunce block" in the cen- 
| and referee at one side; then commence counting 
oidly around to the right, and every number that is 
visible by 7, or of which 7 is a multiple, instead of pro- 
^uncing the number you should say "buzz;" as 1, 2, 3, 
Q 5, 6, buzz, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, buzz, etc., each man pro- 
'uncing but one number. Now, when a man called a 
mber when it should be "buzz" he was caught, and as 
penalty had to go to the dunce block in the center and 
tg a song or tell a story. Any one who did not at once 
^pond to the judgment of the referee, was ejected from 
h circle, and his place supplied by some anxious by- 
jinder. 

jThis game, foolish as it may seem, produced many 
■ars of laughter at Camp Sorghum, for there being 
my men, with no attainments in either, their efforts, 
!der the embarrassments of the occasion, were ludicrous 
leed. 

It was a dark night about the 20th of October that a 
i of us stood wet and shivering around a fire near the 
jad line, that Shelton, suddenly buttoning up his brown 
ins, with emphasis said : 
""I will die here now, or go out of this." 
Before any one in the company comprehended the re- 
iark, he shot like an arrow across the dead and guard 
ies, and was lost in the darkness. A half dozen shots 
3re fired at him, but fortunately none took effect. He 



I 



70 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



was recaptured after ten days, near Charleston, and re- 
turned; but upon a second effort in November went 
through to our lines. He now flourishes in Rochester, I 

K Y. 

The rebels were guilty of but few things more unpar- 
donable than that of hunting down prisoners with dogs, 
as they would a beast. In all civilized warfare, there are 
certain rules of honor — among them, this one : that if a 
prisoner escapes he shall have all the advantage of his 
own sagacity, by having nothing employed against him 
but the sagacity of his guards. In the late war the 
rebels entirely ignored this rule by engaging every means 
against their prisoners — even to the perversion of the 
brute faculties that had been created for a good and 
noble purpose. They had a pack or two of these trained 
dogs at Columbia, which they tried to make as fierce and 
terrible as possible. They would keep them tied up 
through the day, and at evening bring them out upon 
the lawn before us to feed, twelve or fifteen, jumping and 
yelling, and howling around their master for their food. 
It was these dogs that kept more prisoners within the 
guard line than the eight pieces of artillery trained on 
the Camp ; for if one should go out and the dogs find 
his trail, he was sure to be caught, and apt to be torn 
to pieces. 

One night Lieutenant Barker escaped. He was out 
five days. A two horse wagon came rattling over the 
stones towards the camp. It drove over the dead line. 
Two rebels got in, and two stood by and lifted out the 
body of the Lieutenant. Life was still in it, but the gash 
in the side, and the horrible mangling of the throat and 
face, showed that it would soon depart. His Captain 
brother, bending over him, piteously asked: 

"William, what r s the matter?" 

But a whisper only answered — 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



71 



. "Dogs — don't tell mother, Harvey, how it was." 

j Next morning, soon after daylight, they carried the 
young man a hundred yards to the west of the camp 
and buried him. This is all we ever knew about it. 



CHAPTER V. 

j LIEUTENANTS GOOD AND BAKER THE HOME STRETCH THE 

FIRST NIGHT'S DIFFICULTIES OUR ORGANIZATION THE 

FIRST NEGRO OUR FIRST INTERVIEW CHISMAN's SPEECH 

TO THE DARKEYS THE SALUDA RIVER QUANDARY AS TO 

I ROUTE OUR SECOND INTERVIEW WITH THE NEGROES — OUR 

DECISION STREETS OF LAUREN SVILLE THE IRISHMAN'S 

fi SHORT-COMINGS LOCKED UP IN A BARN IN TERROREM 

I GOOD AND THE GANDER MARTIN AND MOSES SUMPTUOUS 

J SUPPER THE TWO CAVALRY-MEN NORTH CAROLINA LINE 

NIGHT AMONG OURSELVES THE HOUNDS AT ROSS'S REUBEN 

CAPTAIN PACE AND HIS COMPANY AFTER US REUBEN'S 

FIDELITY COLLISION WITH CAPTAIN PACE SALUDA GAP 

j THE GUARD IN THE ROAD FLAT ROCK INTERVIEW WITH 

REBEL SOLDIERS HOW WE ESCAPED THEM LOST ON A 

MOUNTAIN, STARVING AND FREEZING THE CULMINATION OF 

J SUFFERINGS AND TROUBLES. 

Our number by this time had swelled to fifteen hun- 
: dred, and to supply all our wants we got not a splinter 
of wood except what we provided ourselves with seven 
; miserable old iron axes, and carrying it a quarter of a 
! mile upon our shoulders. To get wood, a party of fifty 
! men was each morning taken out of the camp to the 
I rebel officer of the day, and there each required to de- 
posit with him a written parole of honor, not to escape 
that dav while out getting wood. Then they were turned 
loose with liberty to go half a mile from the camp without 



72 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



guard. It was something like freedom to get wood, and 
there was always a general rush to get on the detail. It 
was by one of these wood parties that we made our final 
escape. 

The woodmen approached the camp from the west, 
and the guards along that side were instructed to suffer 
them to pass through the guard line and up to the dead 
line with their wood, and there throw it over to the pris- 
oners inside; and were further instructed to be very 
vigilaut to prevent parole men from crossing the dead 
line from the outside, and also to prevent any prisoners 
from crossing from the inside and going out through the 
guard line with those on parole. 

The 4th of November, 1864, was a very bad day. It 
had been raining almost incessantly, and now there was 
quite a proportion of snow driving through the rain. 
The wind that drove it against our unprotected heads 
was from the east. 

Perhaps not a dry thread could be found on all the 
fifteen hundred prisoners. Grouped together here and 
there around a little smoky, green pine wood fire, they 
sat wrapped in whatever clothing they might have, wet, 
cold, hungry and disconsolate. It was one of the gloomi- 
est times I ever saw in prison; but a morsel to eat, and 
it sour and unfit for swine; winter approaching, and no 
shelter nor hope of exchange. Is it wonderful, then, 
under such circumstances, that men should say hard 
things against Secretary Stanton, and even Gen. Grant, 
whose responsibility we always understood was great in 
the suspension of exchange. 

It was on this 4th day of November that I tired of 
yawning around a fire of green pine limbs, and to give 
my eyes a little freedom from the smoke, weut sauntering 
around the camp. While passing along the west side, I 
saw a prisoner from the inside jump across the dead 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



73 



line, and go out and off with the paroled party. A ray 
of hope lighted up my eyes, and I hurried off to find 
Chisman. 

I found him where I expected, sitting by a fire, in a 
perfect jam, smoking his briar- wood pipe of huge dimen- 
sions. He looked unusually forlorn. I never before saw 
him so much so — not a smile, not a word; and the only 
solace he seemed to feel was in the puffs of smoke that 
rapidly broke from his mouth. Eminent writers and 
philosophers tell us that this narcotic is a great evil to 
the world — a great curse; that it is an enemy to health, 
to mind, morals and economy ; and that if it is not abso- 
lutely sinful, it is at least foolish in the extreme to use it. 
Without controverting the soundness of this philosophy, 
I may be allowed to give it as my opinion that, if the 
anti-tobacco ultraists had seen the force of it in prison, 
they would not yet plead "war to the knife, and knife to 
the hilt." I make bold to say that tobacco did do a good 
office in prison. It drove away despondency; it cheered 
the heart; it led the mind away from too long thought 
of home, and invigorated it to invention and resolution; 
and many a life-boat, loaded to the guards, would have 
gone under had it not been for the buoyancy of this 
weed. 

Said I, -'Chisman, come here." 
" What do you want now?" 
" I think I see a chance." 
" For what?" 
" To get out of here." 

" Oh, I have heard enough of your chances." 

" But come and see for yourself;" and we walked off 
towards the side where the men were coming in with 
wood. j 

The wind still drove the rain and snow, and the poor 
guards, old men and little boys, who were about as poorly 



74 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



clad as the prisoners, were nearly all standing with their 
backs to the east, shivering on their posts, while the pa- 
role men were passing and repassing the guard line with- 
out notice. 

" Now," said I, "what do you think of that?" 

" W ell, I am ready for anything," remarked Chisman. 

" They can only kill us, and send us to , whi h will, 

no doubt, improve our condition, and I am ready to risk 
it if you are." 

Our hands closed the bargain, and we started for our 
things. I have said before, that as soon as Chisman and 
I met at Macon, we prepared for "something to turn up." 
In a Idition to our Macon stock, we succeeded at Savannah 
in getting a sheet of tin off' the roof of a dead house, which 
we gave to Lieut. Holman, a regular "down -east" wooden- 
nutmeg of a man, from Vermont, who took the tin. and 
with a couple of stones and an old knife, made out of it 
two as perfect pans as could be. They were 5x8 inches, 
and fitted so closely that th°y were proof even against 
hot grease. One of these pans was an accession to our 
out-fit. At Charleston we added a tin cup; at Columbia 
we stole a meal sack while the guard whistled " Bonnie 
Blue Flag," which not only made us each a haversack, 
but a towel, also. We had a few corn chips on hand, and 
hurriedly baked up what little meal we had. 

We broke our design for the first time, to Lieut. Fow- 
ler, who was guard that day, (for, by the way, we had to 
keep watch over our things to keep our fellow prisoners 
from stealing them), and a few other friends, and with 
salt, matches, thread, b^ead for two days, and a supply of 
tobacco, we slung our haversacks and blankets over our 
shoulder^ and started for the scene of action. A few 
friends followed behind. 

As we went along, Chisman picked up a chip, a^d said : 

" Well, let the fates decide who shall try it first." Up 
it went — down it came — and it was my first trial. 



SEVEN MOFTHS A PRISONER, 



75 



We had not long to wait. A party of eight or nine 
men were approaching. I set out alone, aiming to reach 
the dead line, on the inside, ah out the same time they 
reached it from the outside. As they came up, I com- 
municated some signs, that they might know what I 
wanted. They tavored me — threw their wood over the 
line, then gathered for a moment in a knot. I glanced to 
the right and the left, but saw no guard looking in that di- 
rection. In a moment I was ovet- the dead line, blowing 
and panting like the rest. My blanket was spread over 
my haversack and shoulders, and thus created no sus- 
picion, for the day was so bad, that every ma i who had 
one, had it on. Two other men in my squad had blank- 
ets similarly employed. So I walked out, and away to 
the woods, without any rebel being the wiser. But my 
"last state was worse than the first." I was really more 
troubled now than when in the pen. There I was, out of 
prison, and without restraint ; but to undertake a pil- 
grimage of two or three hundred miles, through an 
enemy's country, without guide or companion, to be prob- 
ably recaptured and murdered, or locked up in some 
county jail in the interior, to suffer and die alone, without 
the knowledge ever reaching my friends, was a task so 
stupendous in its outline, that it was hard for me to find 
eourage to even think of it. As I went to the woods, 
I met another squad going in with wood, and said to 
them that Chisman was waiting at a certain point to 
come out, and that they must assist him all they could. 
The very mention of Chisman's name, who was a favor- 
ite in all the camp, was sufficient to get the most earnest 
assurances that he should be aided. 

When I got to the woods, I sat down upon a log, with 
my back turned towards the camp, afraid to look around 
lest I should see the party coming back without my 
friend, 



76 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



My suspense was soon relieved. An elevation arose 
between, so that from where I sat we could not see the 
camp. Some one said, "There comes a man that looks 
like Chis." I turned suddenly about, and to my over- 
whelming delight, saw the inimitable joker raising the 
hill, with head up, and hand-spike on his shoulder, stri- 
ding like a Weston, full fifty yards in advance of his 
party. This happened about 3 o'clock in the afternoon. 

There were two of the parole party, Lieut. Baker, 6th 
Missouri, and Lieut. Good, 1st Maryland Cavalry, who, 
seeing bow easy it was for us to get out, decided that 
they would call for their written paroles, go back into 
the prison, which would relieve them of their obligation, 
then get out as we had, and join in the expedition. They 
called upon the officer of the day, whom they found 
snugly ensconsed in comfortable quarters, reading the 
news of some rebel victory (?) and asked for their papers, 
saying that they felt too unwell to carry any more wood. 
Whereupon, the dignitary, instead of going with them 
and seeing that they were inside, as was his duty, and had 
been the custom, just handed them their paroles and told 
them to go back to camp, thinking; no doubt, that the 
day was too bad for anybody to be foolish enough to run 
away. The boys started in the direction of the camp^ 
but before reaching it, they gradually changed towards 
the woods, where they arrived in triumph with their pa- 
roles. It took but a moment to destroy and conceal them, 
then they were ready to "come marching hsme." They 
had neither blanket nor rations, nothing but a few rags 
on the^r backs, and wills to escape. Good had been a 
prisoner twenty-three months, Baker, eighteen. A cor- 
poral's guard was passing among us every once in a while, 
to see that all was going right; and to escape suspicion, 
we spent the evening as industriously in the wood busi- 
ness, as any one out. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



77 



At 5 o'clock in the evening, when the drum beat at the 
camp, we went in under a brush pile, and those on parole 
went back to prison. I never will forget with what feel- 
ing Major Young said: 

"Good bye, boys; be cautious, and if you get through, 
tell the people and the President how we are treated." 

How still we laid. Not a hand or a foot stirred, lest 
some passing rebel might hear the noise and find us. The 
cold wet limbs, and the colder and wetter ground, chilled 
us to the very center; but we clung the closer together, 
and shook the time away. 

It seemed an age till tattoo. Some of that age we were 
at home telling of adventures to our friends ; some of it 
we were being chased by hounds; some of it we were 
being recaptured and dragged back to prison ; some of it 
we were drowning, in vain attempts to swim unknown 
rivers in the night. A few minutes after the tattoo had 
summoned the guard to quarters, we crawled from under 
the brush with the utmost silence. Good and Baker 
came from another brush pile simultaneously. The night 
was very dark. Yes, dismally dark. Not a star nor a 
spot of blue sky anywhere, but over head was drawn a 
black mantle of heavy clouds; around us was night, 
woods, and a heavy atmosphere, which, combined, most 
perfectly substantiated the proverbial darkness of a South 
Carolina forest. 

We four grouped together a moment to deliberate ; whis- 
pered like thieves in a chamber, and soon decided that 
our object, for the first night, was to get just as far away 
from Columbia as possible, in whatever direction was 
most practicable. We started through the woods; nobody 
knew in what direction; nobody knew where; slipping 
along like spirits, on tip -toe, in mortal terror of some- 
thing ; stopping every minute to listen ; starting at every 
rustling of the leaves; squatting down to hide from im- 



78 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



aginary men; pushing each other forward to lead; and 
thus we went along for two miles, when we struck a South 
Carolina swamp. In, one man splashed, before we knew 
we were near it. What now must be done ? Drive 
straight through? No. We had heard too much about 
the horrid snakes and aligators infesting them, besides 
seeing something of them as we passed from Savannah 
to Charleston. And we knew nothing of its depth or ex- 
tent. We could not think of trying to pass it. The only 
thing to be done was to go around it; and to the right 
we started for a passage. Tearing through bushes, limbs 
striking in our faces, brushing off our hats, splashing 
in the water, slipping and falling over logs and big stones, 
was the unvarying business of the next hour. 

Now, another body of water is found. Found, not by 
the light, not by the noise it made, but b} the incidental 
failing of a stick in Baker's hand to find support. It was 
evidently more than a swamp — from the nature of its 
edge, it must be a river — yet, a singular one ; apparently 
on a perfect level with the plain, deep, dismal, without 
bank or bottom, creeping along as noiselessly as we 
wished to do. We got a pole, in the darkness, and sounded, 
but the end popped up like a cork, without finding bot- 
tom. Next we struck a match, in a hat, and could see 
the light strike the trees on the other side, a hundred 
yards away. Sure enough, it was a river, and looked like 
it might be Styx. That river — who had a heart stout 
enough to try to swim it? It was not found in our com- 
pany that night, and it was the only way to cross it. 
Then, of course, the swamp was wider and deeper here 
than where we first struck it above. What next? To 
take down the river would be to go back towards Colum- 
bia, we supposed. So we must either cross the swamp or 
go around it in the other direction. Dissappointed, tired, 
and already disheartened at the prospect, we began to 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



79 



retrace our steps. On we pushed, as fast as we could, but 
with Herculean efforts we made but slow progress. On, 
on, on! I cannot say how far or how long we went, but 
we went as far and as long as we could. The night was 
about spent. The chickens in the neighborhood were 
heralding the approach of morning, and we were not 
three miles from Columbia, or two from prison. Still the 
swamp confronted us with all its portents. But some- 
thing must be done, and done now. We must either get 
further away, or prepare to surrender — to not be over 
that swamp by daylight, was equivalent to recapture. 

"I'll try it if the rest will," says one. 

"I'm willing, if the rest are," says another. 

"Well, I'm not afraid," says another. 

"Let us go in," responds a fourth; and we stepped 
into the water. 

The night was not near so dark at this time, the clouds 
had broken up and were flying across the sky, and the 
woods roared with the gale that drove the autumn leaves 
in armies by us. It was much colder, too — freezing now. 
My blood chills yet, when I think of my first hundred 
steps in that swamp. The water was from six inches to 
two and a half feet deep, having in it many old logs and 
limbs, lying here and there, upon a soft slippery bottom. 
The bushes and briars pulled and tore us at every step, 
but the chief trouble grew out of the thought that we 
were liable at any moment to be smitten by a venemous 
snake, or feel one suddenly coil itself around our legs, 
else to set our foot upon the slimy back of an alligator. 
But to say nothing of the briars and bushes, we got along 
well enough, and got through the swamp. 

Now that this much dreaded obstacle was overcome, 
we felt encouraged and made better speed. The forests 
were not so thick, and it was now light enough to select 
our way. We pushed along vigorously — Baker in the 



80 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



lead, and he led us with commendable alacrity. A road 
was found leading through the woods, that had the ap- 
pearance of being but little used. To make the better 
speed we took it to the right, almost on a rim. 

Our ardor exceeded our prudence. Without believing 
it possible, we let a wagon, rolling over the loose sand, 
nearly run over us before it was discovered. Like four 
quails we darted into the bushes and fell on our faces. 
The wagon stopped — men muttered a little — then got out 
and struck a light at the hind end. We raised upon our 
hands and knees, to see a muscular son of Ham approach 
directly towards our place of concealment, with a blazing 
pine-knot in his hand, stooping and gazing as he came ; 
also, a few feet behind him, the light fell upon the rale 
features of, "not a degenerate son of his illustrious sire" 
— Yancy. Before they got close enough, however to see 
us, we raised and "went out of that" in a hurry. One 
trouble from this was the great fear all the following day 
that they would put dogs on our track, but there was 
nothing more of it to us. 

Morning was now upon us, and the next thing to be 
done was to hide for the day. In this, our inexperience 
begat difficulties; we parleyed and we disputed; we actu- 
ally quarreled about what we should do, and where we 
should go. One wanted this, another that; the third de- 
sired something else, and the fourth thought all three 
were wrong, and he right. It was not settled until broad 
daylight drove us to the side of a log, in a cluster of al- 
der bushes. And here we came near freezing. With 
our socks and pants, to the knees, saturated with water 
from the swamp, leaves wet and frozen, and in this con- 
dition we lay down, with nothing under us> and but one 
blanket over us, and suffered most intensely from cold till 
about noon, when the sun came out and warmed us. 

From our experience, up to this time, we all could 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



81 



recognize that some sort of organization was necessary to 
successful escape — just as necessary, in fact, as discipline 
is to a regiment on the battle field. All that afternoon 
we spent lying with our heads together, by the old log, 
discussing and adopting in whispers the following plans 
and organization, which we never had occasion to change 
only in a few unimportant particulars. 

One should be commander; and in this we should take 
turns; the term of office should be twenty-four hours/ 
beginning and ending at 9 o'clock p. m. This command-' 
er's judgment should be final in all dispute?. He should 
say when to begin our march, when to rest, and when 
and where to put in. His authority was supreme in all 
things, unless an appeal from it was sustained by a unani- 
mous vote, except direction, concerning which he should 
consult the party. We were to march in single file, three 
paces apart, so as to keep the front of but one man ex- 
posed to the road — the commander in front— whose duty 
it was, among other things, to keep his eyes and ears con- 
stantly open to catch the first sound or glimmer of an 
object that might approach from the front. No. 2, 
three paces behind, to observe the same vigilance on the 
right; JSTo. 3, to the left; and No. 4, to give his entire 
attention to the rear. If we were passing the road where 
there was woods or weeds on either side, and the com- 
mander saw, or thought he saw or heard a human being 
approaching from the front, he would turn his head to 
the rear and "hiss" gently, but sufficiently loud for the 
rest to hear him, then move hurriedly to one side, the oth- 
ers following hastily, preserving their intervals as nearly 
as possible, each to find a bush or a log, lie down upon his 
face and observe the most perfect silence. Thus we would 
remain until something would pass, or in the opinion of 
the commander he was mistaken ; then when he would 
" hiss" again, we would all get up in our places, move 
6 



82 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



back again into the road and be off as before. If we 
were passing through an open country where we could 
not hide, and the leader should see footmen coming he 
would turn back and "hiss" twice, then he would about 
face and take right back the road as fast as he could pos- 
sibly walk. This he would continue until we came to a 
place where the commander thought we could hide, then 
again he would "hiss" and leave the road as before, 
Nearly all the persons that approached were footmen — 
mostly negroes — and our backward business worked to a 
charm. 

One going along at night and seeing some indistinct ob- 
ject that he takes for a man, if it grows dimmer and dim- 
mer until entirely lost to view, is apt to conclude that 
it was nothing but an optical delusion, or, at all events, 
hardly attempt to hunt it up. We never had any trouble 
in it. But if horsemen were seen coming then we would 
leave the road in any kind of a country. If No. 2, 3 or 
4 should see an object approach in his jurisdiction, he 
would communicate the fact as above to the commander, 
when he would take charge of the movement. 

"We depended mostly upon the negroes for direction 
and food. We applied for their assistance nearly every 
night, in this way: Seldom before 10 o'clock at night, 
when everything was quiet, would we approach their 
quarters. All go up within two hundred yards, then two 
stop, a third go within one hundred yards, and the com- 
mander go alone to the hats. The negroes were remark- 
ably familiar with each other and the country, for a radius 
of ten or fifteen miles. Really they seemed to be ac- 
quainted with every peculiar tree or stone, or cow path 
within that distance. Say we were among a lot of ne- 
groes to night, before leaving we would ask them to give 
us the names of a few of the oldest and most reliable ne- 
groes, ten, twelve, or fifteen miles ahead, or as far as we 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



83 



would aim to go that night. They were always able to 
give the names — being plain Joe, Jim, Jerry — as well as 
tell us precisely where to fiud them. They were very 
minute in descriptions — could generally give the number 
of the cabin in the row, the position from the cotton gin, 
pig pen, or massa's house — just the way to approach 
safest ; whether there was any dogs, if so, how many, and 
how fierce. 

There is not an instance on the whole route where we 
were misled by a negro's description. 

Our leader would go to the cabin indicated, knock on 
the door till some one would answer from within, then 
call out gently, "Bob," "Bill," or whatever name had been 
given : u Come here." 

The credulous negro always came to the door without 
further words, then the commander would pluck him out 
to the side of the cabin ; and invariably, after the first 
few nights, the first thing he told him was that he was a 
Yankee, trying to escape from a rebel prison; that he 
had three companions near by; that they were all nearly 
starved; that our only hope of escape was through his 
aid ; and if this was denied we would have to return to 
prison ; that we could not rely upon finding friends with 
white skins ; and that it was as much for his good as for 
our own ; that he had brought this calamity upon us^ 
that we did not ask much from him, but that he would see 
his friends, such as could be trusted, and ask of each some- 
thing, just what could be spared and nothing more. A 
few words about where we should go to hide and to await 
the preparation of food, and the fellow would be offin per- 
fect ecstacies to communicate his secret to the "colored 
people." 

Generally, every adult on the plantation (house servants 
always excepted) would be notified that some starving 
Yankee prisoners were outside*, which was enough to 



84 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



bring every one out ot his bed, to gather his potatoes, 
ash or hoe cake, or bottle of sorghum. ISTo lights were 
ever seen, and seldom any noise made while they were 
preparing their mites. It would take from thirty min- 
utes to an hour to roast their potatoes and hoe cakes ; and 
then they would begin slipping out to us, four and five 
in a party. Sometimes forty negroes, male and female, 
would come to us from one plantation, each one bringing 
something to give, and lay it at our feet, in the aggregate 
corn bread and potatoes enough to feed a regiment. 

The third man went up within a hundred yards, in 
order to receive and communicate a signal from the leader 
if he should be captured while at the huts. In case of a 
capture by four, or a less number, he should communi- 
cate certain signals by exclamations ; then it was the 
bounden duty of the other three to go to the house and 
give themselves up in the hope of finding an unguarded 
moment in which not only to relieve themselves but their 
comrade, but if he should be captured by any number 
greater than four, he should communicate other signals, 
warning his friends to leave him to his fate. 

We agreed upon a story to tell in case of surprise, and 
each committed every part that there might be no con- 
tradiction, but the leader should do all the talking when 
it was possible. We were not to talk above a whisper, 
cough or sneeze when it could be avoided, nor group to- 
gether in the road ; but all conferences must be held in 
covert places. This was about our organization and 
"plan of campaign," and we solemnly pledged to each 
other that we would faithfully perform and heartily co- 
operate in them. 

It was night when these deliberations were concluded, 
and although but five miles from Columbia and but three 
from prison, we saw during the day not a living creature 
to disturb us. The sky had cleared off and the night 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



85 



came to us bright and beautiful. It was Saturday, and 
soon after dark we began to hear in every direction the 
incomparable " Ya-hoo, Ya-hoo," and songs of the dark- 
ies going to see their wives and sweethearts. We had no 
idea where we were, and but little what direction from 
Columbia. Besides, we had not decided what point ol 
our lines we would attempt to reach. Three were for 
any point on the railroad between Atlanta and Chatta- 
nooga, as most likely to be easily reached in consequence 
of but little rebel force. Chisman was for Knoxville, be- 
cause he had more confidence in the reports of union men 
in Western North Carolina. However, it was agreed that 
we travel west the second night, and the following day 
reach a decision — so, oft* we started towards sunset. 

We were soon out of the woods and into the fields, 
and were not long in finding a "big, broad highway lead- 
ing down," almost in the direction we wished to go. "Not 
far ott, coming down this road was a negro, singing at 
the top of his voice : 

" Massa don't know nothin', don't know nothin' — 

Don't know, don't know." 

We made up our minds before he reached us that he 
should know something. A conference with him could 
do us no harm if his race was as faithful as report said; 
and if they were treacherous and would betray us the 
sooner we found it out the better, as it was impossible to 
get through without their aid. 

B.aker stopped in a fence corner in the field, and the 
rest of us retired a short distance. That wonderful song 
came from a wonderful negro, who pitched it to that key, 
probably, to give notice to Jerusha, down by the river, of 
his coming. 

His melodies were abruptly terminated when Baker 
I accosted him: 

" Good evening, uncle. Where does this road go to ?" 



» 



86 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



" Down to de riber, sah." 
tk Where are you going?" 
" Gwine down dan, sah." 

" Ain't you afraid to be out so late at night, lest those 
Yankees down at Columbia get out and capture you?" 

41 No, sah. I'se not afraid of dem folks." 

" Why? Do you think they are friends of the colored 
people ?" 

" Some say dey is, and some say dey isn't. But I'se 
not afraid of dem." 

" [f you should meet one in the road here, think you 
wouldn't run." 

<> NY), sah." 

" What would you do?" 

" Nuffin ; I wouldn't be aft aid." 

" Well, sir, I am a real Yankee myself." 

" Ts you r 

"And want your he:p." 
" Does you?" 

u I have three companions over there in the field." 

" flas you?" 

" Hold on a minute, Uncle ; we want to talk with you." 

u Oh, I mus' be gwine." 

* Hold on but a minute. We wont hurt you. We're 
your friends." 

" Oh, I'se not afraid ; but I mus' be gwine." 

The word " Yankee" had sent a thrill to the fellow's 
heart, notwithstanding his bravery, which made his heels 
so strangely light that Baker had followed him a hundred 
yards before the rest of us got up. Now he was harder 
to manage than before. To see four Yaukees crowding 
around him, in the night, was too much variety for him, 
and he kept retiring, first to the fence on one side, then 
to the fence on the other side, we following and assuring 
him of our fidelity and friendship; he in turn assuring 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONEK. 



87 



us, with resolute zeal, that he " was n't a bit afraid ;" in 
which, if he adhered to the truth, his actions most grossly 
belied him. 

But the fellow was like all others of his race we after- 
ward met, easily flattered and credulous, and when we 
once turned the key to his heart he was as completely in 
our service as if he had been a brother. 

Ten minutes afterward we had gained such confidence 
from the boy, that he was planning what we should do, 
and where we should go to receive the colored folks from 
Beck's plantation, down on the river. 

We went a half mile along the road with the boy, then 
he led us aeross the fields, around a hill, and into a grove 
in the rear of a loug row of cabins. Hither he soon con- 
ducted not less than twenty negroes. 

This may seem to many a reckless adventure, so soon 
after our escape ; and perhaps it was, but it then seemed 
to us unavoidable. Trusting our secret to negroes, we 
felt was an experiment that must be tried, or it would not 
have been ; for, much as we had heard about the fidelity 
of the blacks, none of us then felt quite willing to risk 
his liberty, if not his life, in their hands. But we knew 
nothing of the topography of the country, nothing of the 
rivers and roads, and had hundreds of miles to go in the 
night time, without compass, guide, or map ; we could 
get no information from the whites — we must have it 
from the blacks. 

Nearly every one brought us something to eat ; a piece 
of corn bread, a yam, or a bottle of sorghum. They were 
a little shy at first, but our hand shaking and familiar ad- 
dress soon brought them into nearness. 

This first conference was, in the main, like all subse- 
quent ones, and can not better be described than by citing 
the old illustration of William Penn's treaty with the 
Indians. Only there were four of us, and each had his 



88 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



group sitting on the ground about him. As one old woman 
came up, we arose and shook her hand, she at the same 
time asking: 

"Now, is you Yankees?'* 

" Yes." 

" Do Massa Linkum want to free us cullud fokes V 
"Yes." 

" Well, de Lod bress him ; I alius thought so." 

This, at the time, greatly impressed and surprised me. 
I was glad to hear it, for I did not believe that this light 
of liberty had then shone in the interior of the South. 
But "truth is mighty, and will prevail." It was no mat 
ter how the rebels might practice their artifices and their 
strategems ; they might be ever so vigilant and cautious, 
yet it was not within their power to withhold from even 
the ignorant slave in the interior so important and nec- 
essary a result of the late war. 

As an example of the means resorted to by the rebels 
to keep the slaves in ignorance and fear of the Federal 
army, I will only mention some of the stories told by this 
first party ; 

First. Their masters had told them that the Yankees 
were fighting to take the negroes from their masters in 
the South, to enslave them again in the North where 
they would freeze to death. 

Second. The Yankees were trying to catch them to sell 
them to Cuba for sugar. 

Third. That the Yankees wanted them for breast works 
in the army ; that they would tie them together, men and 
women, and drive them in front of their white regiments 
to battle. 

Fourth. That the Yankees frequently shot negroes out 
of their cannon, for disobedience, and would punch out 
the eyes of those who would lie down or try to get away 
in time of battle, 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



89 



Of course they did not generally believe these stories 
or they would not have seen us on that night. 

A rod to the left of where I sat with my auditors was 
another group, evidently more pleased and interested than 
mine. I think the principal part were blooming maidens, 
who shook their lusty sides and shoulders around Chis- 
man, whose discourse was so ruinous to mine. The tit- 
tering of his crowd, and frequent outbursts of laughter, 
suppressed with both hands, were eminently embarrassing 
to my sedate remarks, for my congregation fell away, one 
by one, till I had not a listener. Then I followed, and 
leaning against a tree heard Chisman on the Emancipa- 
tion Proclamation. I noted in substance the following: 

" There is not one of you a slave now, if you only knew 
it. Mr. Lincoln has declared by that proclamation that 
the colored people are free everywhere, and he has called 
soldiers enough into the army to stretch around the State 
of South Carolina, and compel your masters to let you go. 
[Tittering.] Thousands and thousands of your race are 
already free. As soon as they get to the northern soldiers 
they tell them to go free, to do what they please, to go 
where they please, to work when they please, and for 
whom they please. And they go to work and earn lots 
of money, five dollars a day, some of them ; and they get 
it themselves every cent of it; and they buy fine clothes, 
and great big high hats; and the women have fine satin 
dresses and parasols ; they have fine horses and buggies, 
and drive headlong through town, splashing the mud on 
everybody. [Snickering.] Then, when Mr. Lincoln finds 
an old colored person who can't labor, he gives him a 
house, feeds him, and cares for him. Why, there is a 
place close to Washington, where Mr. Lincoln has built 
houses for, and is feeding and caring for fifteen hundred 
old and crippled colored people. Then, too, we have some 
rebels in the Korth, who don't want you to get free ; and 



90 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



when Mr. Lincoln finds one of these men, he takes his 
land from him, and his horses, and everything he's got, 
and gives them to the slaves who run away from their 
masters, and I'll bet you'd laugh to see the girls swell 
when they get to thumping away on his piano. [Spas- 
modic laughter.] And it's all a lie aboutjfou having to 
go into the Federal army. The rebels tell you this to 
scare you. You don't go in unless you want to. They 
won't let the girls go in at all, but have them go back in 
the country and work in houses altogether, sewing and 
making clothes for the boys in the army; and they get 
paid for it, too. 

"All the colored boys that want to go into the army to 
fight their old masters, Mr. Lincoln hires them to go; and 
he gives them all the nicest clothes, every one just alike; 
he gives each one a pair of new shoes, and a pair of blue 
pants, a fine blue cloth coat with brass buttons all up be- 
fore, and great big brass things on the shoulders, and a 
new black hat with a brass eagle on each side and a yel- 
low cord around it, with tassels hanging down behind; 
and the prettiest new guns — why, they are as bright as a 
new dollar, and have great long spears on the end to stick 
the rebels with. They are not a bit like the old rusty 
things you see the rebels have. And they are the proud- 
est fellows you ever saw when they sret their new clothes 
on, and their guns and white gloves, and stretched out 
into line. Then it would do you good to see them fight 
in battle. They just won't be whipped. They just raise 
the yell, and go at the rebels, and never stop shooting and 
sticking them until they run them every one. And they 
sometimes capture their masters. Once, in the army, a 
colored boy caught his master, and had him for a prisoner. 
The master thought that because the boy had once been 
his slave, he would not mind, and refused to go when the 
boy told him to. This made the boy mad, and he snatched 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



91 



up his gun and was going to shoot the old fellow, but he 
begged so that he didn't, but made his old master go back 
to his tent and black his shoes [tittering] and chop wood 
enough to get his dinner with. [Renewed tittering.] He 
then left him with the other prisoners. And they make 
officers out of the colored men, who have nothing in the 
world to do but stand around and tell the other soldiers 
what to do. Why, they say they have got one over in 
Tennessee who rides a horse and commands fully ten 
acres of men." [I think the last remark was suggested 
by a story told of General Logan.] 

"If I were one of you I would never work another day 
in the fields, under your master's lash, but I would leave 
here before sun rise, and take every colored man and wo- 
man with me I could. Why, it's a shame to have to work 
as I know you do, and get no better food and clothes. 
We Yankees in the North do better by our hogs and 
horses than your masters do by you." 

Afterwards, when I suggested to Chisman the doubtful 
propriety of such inflammatory stories, he turned to me 
sternly and said : 

" This is no time for your moral lectures, old granny ; 
I'll hear none of them till we get home. We must have 
these darkies for us, and I intend they shall be." 

I never doubted the success of Chisman's policy, but 
there was one thought connected with it that created 
some uneasiness in my mind. It was this: — -If the rebels 
should recapture us, and find out that we had been guilty 
of such incendiarism, they might take our lives in con- 
sequence of it. 

We not only advised, but asked advice of those negroes 
in turn. We broke to them our notion of trying to reach 
our lines in Georgia, which they unanimously opposed. 
They urged that it would not do at all. The country 
was not only full of swamps in that direction, but there 



92 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



was the Savannah river to cross, and "Hood's big army," 
and worse than all else, the colored people in Georgia 
would not be our friends. 

" Dey is all Secesh ober dar." 

"Yes, said an old man they called Abraham, "youens 
had all better go to Knoxville, dey is no big armies up 
dat way, and de colored folks am all for de Yankees; an' 
I was ui to Newbury de tuder day, an' I heard de white 
folks talkin 'bout de tories in Nofl Carlina, an dey meant 
by dat dat dey were for de Yankees." 

This conference took place a nuarter of a mile south 
of the Saluda river, which proved to be that mysterious 
stream we had met the night before, four miles nearer 
Columbia, and we gladly accepted the proposal of these 
people to cross the river here in their canoes, as it would 
be to cross somewhere on either of the routes — Georgia 
or Knoxville. 

Before leaving our n^w acquaintances we had them so 
thoroughly convinced that we were in good faith their 
friends, and desired to do them good, and make them free, 
that we had their entire service at our command. When 
we started to the river, they followed, and when we wished 
to hurry, they wished to detail a load of grievances, which 
became more burdensome as the hope of relief bright- 
ened. We were an hour in getting to the river. It was 
starting and stopping, talking and listening all the way, 
and even when we got to the river, and the oarsmen were 
impatiently holding the boat to the bank, some of them 
still hung to us to hear us tell something more. Every 
brass button that could be spared from our clothes was 
cut off and given them as souvenirs. 

Two big burly fellows were in the canoe to row us over, 
and as many more would have gone if we had permitted. 
A few united strokes shot us to the other side like a dart. 
The boat was tied up to a log, and the two negroes went 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



93 



with us a mile and a half to show us a road in the right 
direction. 

We found the road, we received directions, and parted 
with our friends. 

£Tow we made good use of our legs till morning. We 
were encouraged beyond all expectation; our first adven- 
ture with the negroes had been a succes. We had plenty 
of rations for two days, and in our minds was some idea 
of the country and distance. 

It was after midnight when we left the river, and we 
must have gone not less than fifteen miles before 5 o'clock 
in the morning. We kept the road, but passed near no 
houses if we could conveniently go around them. Two 
or three packs of hounds, an appendage found to nearly 
every important plantation in Georgia and South Carolina, 
were stirred up during the night, but made no savage 
demonstrations. 

As soon as the chickens began to crow and lights to 
appear in the windows, we turned to hide in the thickest 
woods we could find. The leaves were just falling from 
the trees, and we effected our concealment in this way : 
As soon as it was light enough for us to see, we would 
select a secluded spot in the woods, gather a few leaves 
into an old tree top, or among some logs; spread one 
blanket over the leaves, put all our things under our 
heads for pillows ; then lie down together on the blanket, 
and spread blanket number two over us, covered it with 
leaves, our heads and all, leaving but a little hole to 
breathe through. In this manner we slept when we 
could, and listened when we could not. It may contra- 
dict nature, but I will venture the remark that for the 
first four days and nights out of Columbia I never slept 
one moment; and the rest of the party slept but little if 
any more. So intense was the excitement, so painful the 
suspense, so distracted was the mind upon subjects of es- 



94 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



cape, of recapture and of home, that sleep could not find 
lodgment. We had not fully made up our minds what 
route we would take. The negroes had greatly discour- 
aged us in our Georgia route; also between us and Knox- 
ville lay two great ranges of mountains, which we could 
not cross upon the roads, and if a snow fell upon them 
we could not cross any other way, and it was already w T ell 
into November. For further advice we called upon some 
negroes the third night, in the manner before described. 
We found these negroes just as magnanimous, just as 
credulous, and to our surprise of the same opinion about 
the safest and most practicable route to take. They re- 
affirmed the stories of the loyal whites in North Caro- 
lina and of the disloyal blacks in Georgia. This confer- 
ence cleared up all doubts, and when we left there our 
faces and minds were towards Knoxville, taking direction 
at about forty-five degrees from the North star, when it 
was possible to have that guide. 

Twenty-three miles were now between us and Colum- 
bia, and we had less fear and more hope. 

For the next three days and nights nothing worthy of 
special notice transpired. 

On the seventh day a little incident occurred that 
would probably be to our credit to omit, but trusting this 
sketch will come to the perusal of none but liberal per- 
sons, who will only look at these events by the light in 
which they occurred, and who will graciourly admit the 
circumstances to extenuate what, abstractly considered, 
would seem grossly wicked, I proceed to give it. 

It was at a point between Newberry and Laurensville, 
and as was our custom we went into concealment in the 
forest before daylight. This time we had chosen a hick- 
ory tree-top that had broken off half way up while the 
leaves were on, and which still hung to the boughs. The 
trees and bushes seemed thick enough around, and had 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



95 



every appearance of being a good place to hide. So we 
crawled under its branches, spread out our blankets? 
sprinkled on leaves and went to sleep. 

It was after sun-up when the first one awoke, and 
there, to the great bewilderment of all, within six feet 
of our heads ran a beaten path. It had the signs of con- 
siderable travel. "What must be done? What could be 
done in safety ? To be seen in South Carolina by a white 
man was to be caught — we felt certain of that. Here 
hounds were found at every mile, and trained to the busi- 
ness of hunting down men. To get up and move through 
the woods in broad daylight, was an exposure not to be 
hazarded; and to lay there by that path seemed one but 
little less. We were in a painful dilemma, and while we 
lay there debating in a whisper what we should do, Good 
whispered with an expression too full of meaning : 

"Oh, my God! look." 

In a second every eye darted to the South, and there 
within fifty yards of us came a white man along the path 
with a gun upon his shoulder. No time to consult, no 
time to cover faces, no time to resolve — he was upon us 
in an instant. 

Few persons can realize our feelings. There we saw 
the end of our liberty within six feet, and but a single 
look, a single glance, and it would slip away. Heaven 
never read more thankful hearts than ours when he 
passed by without seeing us. He was an old man, and 
his eyes perhaps a little dim, or his mind might have 
been more upon squirrels than Yankees, for he carried 
one in his hand, and chased another before getting out of 
sight. He gave us such a fright that we could not think 
of leaving the tree-top to hunt another place, and be 
seen by squirrel hunters or somebody else; neither could 
we think of sleep any more that day, for much as we 
tried by turns, the thought of our miraculous escape and 



96 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



the ^possibility of another such peril, entirely overcame 
our efforts. We lay in great suspense, wishing for night 
and watching for men. About the fourth hour in the 
afternoon, which seemed to us about the fourth day, 
Baker turned his head from the north, and nervously 
whispered : 

"Boys! boys! what will we do? I see that same man 
coming right back this path." 

This time he was a considerable distance off w T hen first 
discovered, and we had time to think and determine. 
After he had passed in the morning we discussed his case 
fully, in the light of his having seen us, and unanimously 
agreed that it would be a desperate case, and required a 
desperate remedy. We might swear him and let him go, 
we might beseech him, we might threaten him, we might 
force him to stay with us till night; yet, in either case, he 
might and probably would put a pack ot hounds on our 
track in an hour after his release. 

I never shall believe that it emanated from a bad heart 
when Good observed: 

" Dead men tell no tales." 

" Shall we do that if he sees us ?" came hesitatingly 
from Baker. 
"Do what?" 

" That which Good spoke of this morning." 

"Is it the safest thing?" 

"Yes." 

" Then, let us do the safest." 
"What with?" 
"His gun." 
"Shoot him?" 
"No; strike him." 

An innocent man's blood was a heavy load to carry 
through life, but the horror of rebel prisons, and the 
hope of liberty and home, surmounted all other consid- 



SEVEN MON HS A PRISONER. 



97 



erations, and we were wrought up to the terrible thought 
of sending the old man to "that undiscovered country 
from whose bourne no traveler returns," if he were so 
unfoitunate as to discover us. This time we had the 
leaves better over us, and thrice happy for us and for him 
he again passed us by unheeded. 

The boldest thing we did during the trip was to pass 
through the streets of Laurensville. We were on a road 
leading to that place, and struck a stream of water run- 
ning through its suburbs. In the darkness it appeared 
like a considerable river. We wandered up and down its 
bank to tind a canoe or some available stuff for a raft, 
without any success. We were all cowards when it came 
to the black portentous waters of an unknown river, 
Down below the ford some distance we found a railroad 
bridge on high trestlework stretching over the stream. 
It appeared to us that the only way to get over was to 
cross on that bridge or swim, and as we did not like the 
latter we started to do the former after listening ii tteen 
minutes for a guard. It was 2 o'clock in the morning, 
and everything in silence and slumber when we crawled 
on hands and knees over the bridge and into the edge of 
town. JS"ow, thought we, it will be just as perilous to go 
around the town as to go directly through it; be-ides, if 
we go directly through we can keep our road, which we 
may have much trouble to find it we leave it. Off we 
started, one after the other, reaching out for dear life, in 
the middle of a street covered with loose sand, making 
no more noise than four cats. A lamp was burning at 
each street corner and in many of the business houses. 
These lights were vexatious, but the most embarrassing 
feature was the short legs of Lieutenant Good whose Fin- 
igan lordship was illy adapted to pedestrian matches, and 
who unfortunately held the position of No, 2 in the march. 
He was as willing as could be desired, and his strokes as 
7 



98 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



frequent but his measures were vastly inadequate to the 
occasion. No. 1 rapidly extended his interval and Nos. 
3 and 4 closed theirs as soon and were then unkind if not 
cruel enough to take advantage of their longer legs and 
transpose the vigorous Irishman to the rear. 

But we got through the town of four thousand inhab- 
itants, Without any serious difficulty. Almost in the sub- 
urbs of the town, and just after resuming our proper 
places, we came upon a half dozen persimmon trees, 
loaded to the ground with ripe fruit. Our attention was 
called to them by their delicious fragrance, and I, being 
in the rear, could not forego the pleasure of stopping to 
jerk off a few in my hat. Chisman, in the lead, was en- 
raged at my disobedience, and came hurrying back with 
uplifted cane to drive me to my place in line, averring 
the while " that nature made a great mistake in my crea- 
tion, by not providing me with the grinning face and 
sleek tail of an opossum, to have had supreme delight in 
eating persimmons." I never thought so. 

Two or three nights after leaving Laurensville, we got 
into another dilemma. Good turned out a negro man 
from his sleep at ten o'clock at night, and brought him 
out into a corn field for a conference. We told the fel- 
low our whole story with its usual plaintiveness, but 
somehow it failed to arouse the ordinary enthusiasm in 
him. He heard our story without any emotion — said his 
master was very hard on them, did not give them enough 
to eat; beside, "Massa would cut his head off, sure, if he 
ever found out that he had given Yankees aid." 

This was the first time we had met with discourage- 
ment from the blacks, the first time they had not mani- 
fested pleasure in helping us ; it was a time, too, when 
we needed it more than usual. I believe we were en- 
tirely out of provisions. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



99 



After much flattery for his prudence and caution, we 
prevailed upon him to promise to get us up something to 
eat. But we must leave that field and let him hide us as 
he chose. This we did not hesitate to do, for the negroes 
had been so uniformly faithful that we had no doubts, 
and. only said to him lead the way. Off we started, sli^ 
ping through the corn and over fences, till we inched 
the barn-yard. We had never been hidden about 7 build- 
ings before, and such a retreat was not alt ogether harmo- 
nious with our ideas of safety, yet it must be all. right in 
a friendly negro, and when he unlocked and opened the 
door to a log barn we loliowed - Kim in without a ques- 
tion. 

The first upor and our apartment was stuffed full of 
unbaled cotton, excepting a little space near the door, 
and the man requested us to lie down here, and be per- 
fectly quiet until he came again. He then went out, shut 
the door and went away. The cotton was so soft, so 
bed-like, that we all went to sleep, took quite a nap, 
woke up, and the negro had not yet returned. Suspicion 
began to creep upon us. What could delay him so longr 
Surely he had been gone an hour, and that was enough,- 
We listened, we whispered, we pulled our way through - 
the cotton to the cracks in the barn, looked out, saw 
nothing, heard nothing. We were not more than three 
hundred or four hundred yards from the master's house, 
and there was a light in the window, while every negro 
hut was as dark as the night. Could it be possible that 
the rascal had either abandoned or betrayed us? and yet; 
we could imagine no excuse for delay. If they had noth- 
ing to give, why did not he return to report ? if they did 
have to give, they had plenty of time to prepare it. 

Our own philosophy frightened us, and all decided to 
leave the barn and negro at once. We put on our accou- 
terments, picked up our sticks, and were ready for the 



100 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



march, tried to open the door, and — "Ye Gods I" it was 
locked on the outside. 

"No, no !" said two or three voices at the same time, 
"it is not locked — he only closed it." 

In an instant we were all pushing at that door like it 
was coming to crush us. Why we were so frenzied, why 
we crowded each other so to get "my strength against it," 
or why we did not combine our strength against it, I can 
give no reason now; but there was such distraction, such 
individual resolution to get out of that prison, that all 
reason was blind, and we crowded around that door, 
pushing and accusing each other; then diving into the 
loose cotton to the wall, hunting some hole for escape; 
then on top against the loft, and with back and shoulder 
lifting with all force at the boards loaded heavy with hay? 
then back to the door, and accusing another of being 
guilty of knowing the fellow locked the door, or of 
thinking the negro treacherous, without expressing him- 
self or something else. Each one felt that some one was 
responsible, or ought to be, for us getting into the trap, 
while the truth was we all went in without a suspicion. 
We were "taken in," beyond all doubt. The door was 
locked, and for what purpose ! Certain to keep us there 
until he returned again, and if he intended to return as a 
friend why deem our confinement necessary. The case 
seemed clear, he had locked us there in that stronghold 
till he could gather force enough to capture us. Oh, but 
if we ever got out of that barn safely, we would never 
trust another negro; no, indeed, we would shun them 
hereafter as we would the rebel army. 

It seemed fully an hour after our suspicions were 
aroused before we heard footsteps approaching the barn. 
Tramp, tramp, tramp they came, a half dozen of them, 
with dogs growling around. Our hearts leaped to our 
mouths — the leader faintly whispered, "Shall we fight 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



101 



them?" and noby answered, but we trembled from head 
to foot as the rusty lock creaked outside. We stood 
ready to be delivered when the door swung back. Open 
it came and in stalked Joe, with four other black men, 

armed to the teeth with corn bread and roasted sweet 

potatoes. Joe was acting in good faith all the time, and 
tried to explain his absence by saying that there had 
been a light in his master's window, and that they could 
not safely proceed with their cooking until the white 
folks were all in bed. I think however, after all, from 
Joe's manner of conversation, that it took him about all 
the time to stir among the negroes and get back. We 
felt so good when we learned that the fellow had not 
been false, that we did not even scold him for the scare 
he had given us; besides he had made considerable 
amends by the good quantity of excellent potatoes. 
However, we left there that night, firmly resolved never 
to get into such another snare, even if negroes did pro- 
pose it. 

The first several days out our principal want was meat. 
We could get almost everything else from the negroes we 
needed in sutlicient quantities, but of meat we got none 
of any kind, from the fact that they got none themselves, 
j nor had they, as a general rule, drawn a mouthful trom' 
j their master's larder for two years, in consequence of the 
demand of the army. Our systems very much needed 
meat. Our appetites, their spokesmen, cruelly teased us 
night and day for something to supply muscle. To meet 
j this demand we, two or three times, visited hen-roosts 
! with "felonious intent/' but were every time disturbed 
by disturoed dogs, and out of distinguished respect for 
the rest and quietude of these quadrupeds, we forbore 
| any further enterprises of that sort. But a capital idea 
struck Good one night, as we came upon a flock of geese 
| sitting in the road in their slumber. 



102 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



" Say, boys ! let's have a goose for to-morrow." 

Why we could almost taste the savory "sentinel oi' 
Rome" in the very words as Good spoke them. Cer- 
tainly, everybody was agreed, and the leader led back the 
road a piece to prepare for capture. They were sitting 
so close to a house that the leader thought it safest for 
us to drive them up the road out of hearing of the folks. 
So at it we went, whispering "shew, shew, shew," but 
the offended family, instead of walking quietly off' at 
command, set up an uproarious "hut, tut, tut, tut," which 
succeeded in repulsing us completely. We fell back a 
few rods for another council* Leader this time said we 
Would walk up abreast and simultaneously fire a volley of 
clubs into their ranks, and surely some one would bring 
down a bird. Our walking sticks were the very things, 
heavy enough to be deadly, and they were used. Whiz 
went the canes — slam against the fence one or two of 
them, and off went the geese, noisy as before, not one of 
them harmed. It was too bad, but enough to frighten us 
all away but Good. The loss was too great for the Irish- 
man; he could not give up "his goose for to-morrow," 
and instead of running off up the road with us, he gath- 
ered his stick, and singling out his gander went for him, 
Up by the barn-yard gate they went, now across the 
road, now down the lane by the house, Good's diminu- 
tive pot legs plying vigorously, and the old gander flap- 
ping and flapping, and making the very night silence 
shake with his "quack! quack! quack!" Just as the 
enthusiastic young man was about to make his levy near 
the yard-gate, suddenly, like a peal of thunder, a pack of 
hounds broke from a kennel upon him. We heard the 
attack several hundred yards up the road, and stopped 
for the result. The wonder is that they did not tear him 
all to pieces, for he took the right course to that end, 
Hardly had we turned about till we saw the frightened 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



103 



Irishman come flying up the road (I mean in his way) 
with a dozen hounds at his heels, snapping and barking, 
and he piteously calling, in a subdued voice, "boys, 
boys;" with a blanket in one hand and his cane in the 
ether, striking furiously to the right and to the left. As 
momentous as was the occasion, sobriety had more than 
it could bear. We were all convulsed with laughter : 

"Drive off the d d dogs," he cried, as he ran into 

our midst, almost out of breath; "you'd laugh to see a " 
man tore to pieces, wouldn't you ?" 

The dogs were as cowardly as Good, for soon as we 
showed fight with our sticks, they retreated rapidly. We 
called Good "goosey" afterwards. 

Meat was plenty enough after we learned how it was 
to be had. South Carolina, po^r as it is for agricultural 
purposes, supplies a good many pigs, and they were fat 
and fine in the fall of 1864. A family of darling little 
porkers, weighing fifteen or twenty pounds each, might 
have been found almost any night, asleep with their 
mother, in a fence corner or pen. It was a trifling mat- 
ter to slip up and seize one of the little sleepers by the 
hind legs and dash his brains out against the ground be- 
fore he had time to squeal, else to take a heavy stick and 
knock him to his eternal skep without awaking him 
from his temporal. Then it was easy to bleed him with 
a pocket knife, and just as easy to throw him on the 
| shoulder and carry him to the woods, skin, and cut out 
: of his tender flesh whatever was convenient to carry, and 
j leave the carcass to the crows. Of course we did not 
kill any of them in this way, for it was against the law. 
but if we happened to have any fresh pork or sweet po- 
; tatoes to cook we had no trouble in accomplishing it. 
j Before going under the leaves for the day, and as soon as 
it got light enough to see, we would provide a couple of 
j stones, three inches in diameter, a tin cup of water, and 



104 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



quite a bundle of dry faggots, the size of a rve straw, 
from the bushes round about. With these at our heads 
we could go to sleep. During the day, when any one 
waked up and wanted something to eat, something warm 
and good, he would turn over on his face, set the Savan- 
nah tin pan upon the two stones, place some dry faggots 
underneath, strike a match, set them on fire, put in his 
meat, well salted and washed) keep adding as his faggots 
burned out, and in half the time he could get it at home, 
he was eating his meat and potatoes, his corn bread and 
gravy, with epicurean pleasure. This tin pan was as 
valuable as the magician's wand. We would fry meat, 
boil potatoes and make coffee in it, all the same hour. 

One night, a few miles northeast of Greenville, S. C, 
we took tea, by invitation with a party of colored folks, 
one Martin, a "yaller man," of Pogram extraction being 
the principal deacon of the occasion. The feast was pre- 
arranged by fourteen hours, and Martin spared no efforts 
or liberality to make it a feast of fat things. Moses, 
Martin's oldest son, had enough of the predominant Po- 
gram in him to make him second in rank in the service, 
and it was he that led us from the cane-brake to the re- 
ception under the hill. 

After the usual salutations, we surrounded the table, 
or, rather the table cloth, spread upon the ground. There 
was upon it four white plates, four cups and saucers, 
knives, forks, &c. To eat, there was in the center a nicely 
dressed hen at one end, a cord of ginger bread at the 
other, a pot full of steaming coffee, with pumpkin pies 
and other things intervening; and everything was well 
prepared and good. Yes, actually good, any place; and 
from their chuckling and askance looks as we munched 
their provender, I am certain that we left our host with 
a good opinion of Yankee capacity for food. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



105 



Martin was determined that Moses should join our 
party. 

"He is de sharpest boy in all de country; every body 
says so; and I want him to go to de Notf to git laririn." 

Without consulting us as to oar pleasure in the mat- 
ter, he went all over the country that day, offering sixty 
dollars for a pair of shoes to fix off Moses; but he failed 
to get them, and we persuaded the anxious paternal that 
his hopeful could not possibly make the trip without them. 

Our eyes were as heavy as our haversacks that night 
when we went upon the road. Good was in front, and 
suffered his mind to rec^r too much to the little episodes 
of the evening, perhaps, for he let two horsemen ride up 
within a hundred yards of our front before he " hissed." 
To the left was a field, to the right an open forest, with- 
out bushes or weeds, but appearing best for our escape, 
Good took it in a twinkle, and we after him. Twenty 
yards from the roadside we fell upon our faces, with heads 
to heels, to form the appearance of a log, and lay as still. 
I think the moon was shining, for it was almost light 
enough to count the buttons upon the strangers' coats. 

Chisman's heel struck me in the forhead, when we 
heard the rattling of sabres. They were two cavalrymen, 
and had seen us, too. Just opposite where we laid, nearly 
breathless, they reined up their horses and stood gazing 
in our direction. 

"Sam, I'll be if I didn't see a man." 

"Are you sure ?" 

" Yes, I'm sure." 

"Oh, I guess it might have been a cow." 

"No, sir; I'll be if it wasn't a man" 

"Well, if it was a man, where do you think he is by 
this time?" 

"I don't know, but it was a man, sure." 



106 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



"Well, it was somebody's nigger, if you did see one ; 
'les £0 on." 

We always thought they were afraid, or they would 
have ridden a little way into the woods ; but when they 
rode on without it they had our full approbation. Good 
laid for nearly a half hour after they left, before he could 
find heart enough to "hiss" back upon the road. This 
was another stimulus to caution. 

We longed much for the loyal white men of North 
Carolina, whom we had heard so much about all along 
the way, and we were now very near their border. We 
felt that as soon as we placed South Carolina at our backs, 
that our work would be almost done — that we would be 
nearly home. The night that we expected to pass the 
border, we walked with perhaps more spirit than on any 
oth-T occasion. Right on we pushed, through branches, 
over hills, up the side of the Blue Ridge, till about mid- 
night, when we came upon a pillar of hewn limestone, 
standing six feet out of the ground, upon the summit of a 
mountain, on the south face of which was inscribed " S. 
C, 1849," and on the north face, «K C, 1849." 

Eureka and amen! We had at last reached the much 
desired point which marked the division between friends 
and foes. So we did not tarry long, but shaking the 
South Carolina- dust from our feet, we spat once more up- 
on the hated State and went on. We skipped down the 
side of the mountain into North Carolina, with heels and 
hearts as light as homeward bound school boys. But 
had it been possible, and had we but lifted the curtain 
that hid from us the next twenty days and saw the loads 
of trouble and hardships that awaited us, we would have 
been almost persuaded to turn back to prison, for while 
we felt that we were almost home, and the difficulties 
almost overcome, the facts were that we had hardly 
passed through the preliminaries to the great system of 
troubles that awaited us. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER, 



107 



In the first place, the first night after entering the State 
we had trouble among ourselves. We happened upon a 
negro man who was going to start next morning for Ash- 
ville, sixty miles, with two bales of stocking yarn for the 
rebel government. He was going to drive four mules, 
fill up his wagon with stripped corn blades; and his mas- 
ter had a brother living four miles north of Ashville. 
This fellow entreated us to join him; he would cover us 
up in his wagon with the fodder, haul us to Ashville in 
two days, take as through town to his master's brother 
on the other side, get there in the night, unhitch his four 
mules and give them to us, and he would steal one from 
his master's brother, and with the mules we could ride to 
the Yankees, thirty miles beyond, the same night. Two 
wanted to join the negro, and two did not. Chisman and 
I thought that since we had come so far successfully, we 
would not assume any unnecessary hazards to save a little 
labor and time. Baker and Good thought it a rare chance. 
We all had confidence enough in the negro, but there 
were these difficulties apprehended by Chisman and my- 
self: There were two thousand troops at Ashville, and 
foraging parties daily putting out on all the roads for 
many miles. One of these parties might seize the fodder 
of the negro and find us underneath it, or they might 
| search the wagon for contraband goods; or some one 
might get into the wagon along the road to ride, and take 
position on us. These were our principal reasons for ob- 
jection; but besides, we had a mind to doubt that the 
Yankees were only thirty miles from Ashville. Then we 
also feared that if we were captured in company with a 
negro, that it would be an excuse for the rebels to hand 
us over to the civil authorities, to be dealt with as kid* 
nappers, instead of prisoners of war. This last reason 
led to a spirited dispute, which, I am ashamed to say, 
culminated in blows, the character and extent of which, 

* 



108 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



the public would blame me if I told. Here we came near 
having a rupture — a division of the party — bat under the 
arbirtary circumstances alone, the matter was dismissed, 
or suspended, and we journeyed on as before, leaving the 
negro behind. 

The next night began a chapter of troubles. We came 
to a respectable looking farm house sitting very near the 
roadside. Houses of this class we had generally gone 
round, but since we were now in North Carolina, in the 
land of the loyal, and after listening a few minutes the 
leader decided to move on past the house independently. 
It was four o'clock in the morning, and nothing seemed 
to be astir or awake, as we moved up silently in the 
bright moonlight; but, when just opposite the door, and 
when least expected, a pack of hounds broke from under 
the porch upou us in an instant. They were too soon 
upon us, and too numerous to then think of flying, so we 
hastily "rallied by fours," to use a military term, or placed 
our backs together, thus facing in all directions, and be- 
gan a vigorous battle with our clubs. While thus en- 
gaged, the gentleman (?) of the house opened and stood 
in the door, in his night clothes, within thirty feet of us, 
afraid to speak or retire. We could less stand his eyes 
than the dogs, and we broke up our position of defense 
and ran off up the road, striking as we went. 

Having reached the woods on the other side of the 
house, and driven off the dogs, we stopped for a moment 
under a tree to consult. That we had been seen by a white 
man this time, was certain, and that he had a pack of fierce 
hounds was also certain. Besides, it was nearly morning, 
and at daylight our tracks could be easily recognized and 
scented. Again, what must we do ? Everybody will say 
as we did: "Why, leave the road and get just as far 
away from there before day as possible, and in as puz- 
zling a manner as possible." 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



109 



Into the woods we went, through branches and up 
branches, now walking backwards, now forwards; now 
walking on the fences with long poles, turning the top 
rails over as we passed, now stepping in each other's 
tracks and dragging a wet blanket after us, all the time 
doing our very best for distance — sometimes by the road- 
side, sometimes in the field. I never labored so hard in 
my life for an hour and a half, and I think we must have 
walked and ran at least six miles in the time; and we 
might have gone even farther had we not come to a cross 
roads, with a few unimportant houses about; maybe a 
blacksmith and a grog shop, all possessed by the lord of 
that rich looking mansion two hundred yams to the left, 
with- a long low of negro huts stretched in the back- 
ground. It was these negro huts that induced us to stop 
as soon as we did, for they had become distressingly 
scarce along the road; so much so, that for the last two 
nights we had been bothered in getting enough to eat ; 
and, as we expected soon to enter the mountains proper, 
this was perhaps the last opportunity we would have to 
get aid from the negroes; and some how or other the 
"good Union people" we had heard so much about were 
always a little ahead. 

We went into concealment as convenient to the huts as 
possible. And that was another day of extraordinary 
suspense and anxiety. Every dog that barked to the 
south of us was hounds following the trail; every squir- 
rel that jumped in the leaves was a man's footfall. No- 
body had anything to eat but shelled corn, yet, nobody 
got hungry that day ; none of us had slept a moment the 
night before, but nobody's eyes were closed or ears stopped 
for the twelve long hours we lay in the chestnut tree-top. 
If one would turn over or stretch out his legs, or draw 
them up so as to rattle the leaves, his three companions 
would in concert whisper: "Be still. Don't make so 



110 SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 

much noise." Although concealed in the midst of a for- 
est, in an excellent place, and perhaps not a human being 
within a quarter of a mile all day, yet all this caution 
seemed necessary, for those two eyes that looked at us 
from the door the morning before followed, haunted, and 
stared at us all the time. They were in our eye-lids, they 
were under the blanket, they were in the azure space — 
everywhere, like demons around the demented inebriate. 
But when night came, we still lay under our leaves, un- 
molested by either dogs or rebels. 

About 10 o'clock Leader with ETo. 2 started for the 
huts, dodging through the corn, as but few times before. 
This expedition came near being abandoned after all, on 
account of our fright the morning before; but fearing we 
could find nothing at all to eat in the mountains we en- 
tered upon it as our last chance. A negro man was found 
without much effort, and led out into the field for a con- 
sultation. For ten minutes after the party all joined him 
he was frightened nearly to death. 

"Lawdy ! Ef you all is Yankees you bettah be gittin* 
away from here, for Massa Cap'n Pace's got his comp'n; 
out dis night to cotch Yankees. He says Massa Eos? 
seed some pass his house dis monin'" 'foh day, and dey's - 
somewha in dis country yit. But if you all is Yankees 
you won't hurt no cullud people, wiB you? I doesn't go 
about much, but brudder Reuben he knows a heap ; ev'ry- 
body says Ruben is sharp, an Reuben he say de Yankees 
am good people/' 

"And where is Reuben ?" 

"Lod bress you ! he's on guard, wid a gun, w at chin' at - 
de Cross Roads for Yankees." 
"Who put him there?" 

" Massa Pace ; and I got to take his place in half an 
hour. 

" We conversed with the fellow several minutes, ancfj 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



Ill 



though apparently willing we were not satisfied to trust 
him with the superintendence of anything, he was so 
ignorant and unfamiliar with everything, and though 
very hungry we preferred that Reuben, that sharp colored 
man, should look after something for us to eat. 

This fellow said he would go and tell Reuben about us 
being down in the field, and he knew that Reuben would 
come to us, "for he do want to see de Yankees de wust." 

We dismissed him after exacting from him a promise 
to break his secret to none but Reuben, and told him to 
send Reuben to us at the water gap. A little doubtful of 
Reuben's admiration of Northerners, from the fact that 
he was standing guard to catch them, we withdrew fifty 
yards from the water gap and laid down under some 
bushes to watch. 

I am sorry that the katydid was so relentless in her 
-iong that night, for as much as I used to admire this 
pleasant little serenader, when she sings at my window 
now she disturbs my sleep. 

The day had been one of extraordinary suspense in 
consequence of having been seen the morning before, and 
\ night had brought to us the confirmation of our fears 
| that the country was all astir over the appearance of a 
gang of men supposed to be Federal soldiers. And would 
it be prudent, or even rational, for us to lay within gun- 
; shot of a rebel company and wait for a negro to stack his 
yjgon and visit us, the very objects of their alarm, as a 
friend? Then, if ever so desirous of helping us, how 
could he in the very presence of the rebels with any safety 
1 to himself or us, when the rebels were likely to call him 
at any moment for duty? But before us frowned the in- 
hospitable mountains, within two hours' walk, and how 
could we think of entering them, more than a hundred 
miles across, the last of November, with scarce a pint of 
shelled corn to the man? Then, if we attempted to march 



112 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



that night without more reliable information than we had 
received, what moment would we not expect to be fired 
on or halted by some lurking lookout? 

Under these discouraging circumstances we smoked 
and waited for the coming of Reuben, while the sharp 
shrill notes of numberless katydids were poured forth 
unceasingly, like the whippo-wils of the Rapidan, adding 
ten fold to our loneliness and fear. But — 

"Listen!" said Baker. U I hear somebody tramping 
through the stubble. It may be Reuben." 

"Yes; I hear it plain," responded all three; and soon 
the form of a monstrous looking individual was seen 
slipping across the wheat field. Straight to the water gap 
he went and whistled a few times gently. 

Satisfied that it must be Reuben we went to him. Sure 
enough, it was the sharp colored man who had been on 
guard, and a very different man from the one who had 
been there before. Reuben was forty years old, he said, 
and a laugh-and-grow-fat sort of man, round, and as vain 
as a titled Englishman ; a regular Count Fusco, all the : 
time in a silly laugh. In a perfect convulsion of laughter 
he seized our hands, two at a time, and gave them each a 
regular lover's squeeze, holding on and crushing away for 
a minute or two. 

" What is the matter with you ?" inquired Chisman a 
little piqued. 

" Why, you see, ole massa — ha, ha, ha, ha — ole massa — 
ha, ha, ha, ha — has me tryin' to catch you gemmin, for 
two hours — ha, ha, ha, ha " 

" Well hush up, you fool you. Quit your laughing and 
tell us all about it," replied Chisman, rather unevangel- 
ically. 

" What ! Catch you Yankees ! Why, sah, I'd radder 
ctach my granmudder runnin' from de debil — ha, ha, ha." 
" But, sir, we do beg of you to hush laughing so, for 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



113 



some one may hear you and it may lead to our cap- 
ture." 

" What ! Yoa capture. Why one of you gemmen 
might take a big rock and run ebry man home Massa 
Cap'n Pace's got, and me too, if I was on guard like I 
was. Ha, ha, ha." 

"But come, uncle; I say quit laughing and tell us what 
about Captain Pace and what they are doing up at the 
house, or we will swallow you alive." 

" Tink you'll have a heavy stomach if you swallow me, 
sah. Ha, ha, ha." 

We got altogether out of patience with Reuben before 
we got the laughter out of him sufficiently to talk intel- 
ligibly. Then he proceeded in his way to tell us as his- 
brother had in part how Massa Ross had seen four men 
pass his house a little before daylight that morning, whom 
he took for Yankees. Captain Pace had been notified of 
this fact and had called out his company of men to watch, 
for us that night, and had been assured by Ross that the 
strangers could not possibly have passed the Cross Roads, 
up by u my Massa," before light, and it was along the road 
from the Cross to Ross' that twenty men were posted 
with guns to watch for somebody, evidently us. 

The war having called every able-bodied male between 
.sixteen and sixty into the army, the remaining old men 
and little boys over the country were organized into 
^emergency companies, and armed to repel raids, to sup- 
press insurrections, and for such other emergencies as 
might arise. 

Pace was the captain of one of these companies, and 
his actions on this occasion, perhaps his first official duty,, 
were much better described by Reuben than they will be 
T by me. He said the King's officer was mounted on an: 
-old white horse, galloping from post to post, armed with 
Ja sabre, two revolvers and a shot gun — and Reuben said 



114 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER 



once that he had a piece of artillery mounted behind him 5 
but he took that back. 

To he sure of adequate force for four disarmed Yan- 
kees the gallant captain had called three or four trusty 
negroes to supply the place of absentees. Two or three 
times the brave captain rode up to him with: 

(t "Now, Reuben, remember to halt them three times, and 
if they don't then stop, fire at 'em and aim low. Look 
carefully and be still, and if we don't catch the rascals 
to-night, why, call me a coward." 

Reuben was just the man for us to see, for he had intel- 
ligence enough to advise and humor enough to cheer us. 
In spite of our first impulses and our surroundings the 
fellow would provoke from us an occasional laugh— not 
that his tale was so funny, but that his humor and expres- j 
sion were. 

His story about running off' to the Yankees was rich. 
His master sent him on an errand to Hendersonville and 
while there a notion came into his head to go to the Fed- 
erals, and away he went for the Tennessee line. 

Our forces were at Bull Gap, and reaching a mountain 
that overlooked their camp fires his heart failed him and 
he lay there watching the smoke and light for two days 
and nights, eating nothing but huckleberries. This grow- 
ing dull he retraced his steps homeward, fully convinced 
in his own mind that the Yankees were a bad people and 
would have killed him instantly if he had gone to them.i 
When he reached home he told his master that while at 
Hendersonville a rebel officer found him and made hire 
go to Ashville and work on the fortifications. 

Eeuben's first advice was not to think at all of trying 
to travel any that night. He did not know how far th( 1 
report had spread about there being Yankees in the coun 
try, and the rebels might be on the lookout for us at somd 
other point, for people were likely to be unusually watch 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



115 



fnl to-night, anyhow, and he wanted to talk with us a 
"long time," and he knew where to hide us for the next 
day, that would puzzle our shadows to find us. We de- 
cided to tarry as advised. Then the next thing was 
something to eat. We had been nearly thirty hours on 
nothing but shelled corn, and now that we had agreed to 
lay over a day, and to be so securely hid, we began to 
feel some emotions about something more substantial to 
eat than corn. Upon this point we sobered Reuben 
effectually, for we treated of a fact that vitally interested 
him. 

" Can you give us something to eat, Reuben ? — we're 
mighty hungry." 

u Oh, yes, sah ! oh, yes, sah ! — git you something to eat, 
sho ; but, gemmen, massa mighty hard on us; doesn't gib 
us hardly nuffin to eat; but, gemmen, you shill have 
plenty to eat, if I has to steal for you- — and, golly, I'se 
good at dat." 

Now, Reuben remembering that he had been with us 

an hour, and that they might miss him up at the Cross 
[ Roads, and involve him in suspicious circumstances, he 
I hurried us oft' to a spur of the mountain, and to a large 

shelving rock, covered with a chestnut tree-top, a place 
■ familiar with other darkies of the plantation, and leaving 
S us here, he said that if he could not come again soon 

with something to eat^ he would send another cojor : 

person. 

Reuben, chuckling over the good joke of standing 
# guard for us and hiding us, all in the same hour, started 
in a bear gallop down the declivity to his post of duty, 
i and we had nothing further from him until after mid- 
m night, when he came leading the way up to our conceal- 
i| ment, followed by his ignorant brother, Jubal, and two 
if wenches, bearing a big pot of boiled cabbage. The boys 
Ml had both been discharged from further duty as guards. 



116 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



"Golly, gemmen, we's got you's a pot of mighty good 
cabbage — we wus gwine to hab it for dinner to-morrow, 
but my wife said she'd cook it for youens." 

There was the cabbage, submerged in the liquor, and 
still warm and delicious. Too hungry to empty it in our 
tin pan, or to make wooden forks to lift it out — too hun- 
gry to wait a moment for polite preparation — into the 
liquor we went with thumbs and fingers for a bite, and 
they went in and out with astonishing rapidity. If I 
could hope to sustain the statement, I would deny that I 
was as greedy as the rest, tor they will all be ashamed 
when I tell the public how they, jealous of each other's 
share, increased their feeding capacity from a thumb and 
one finger, to a thumb and two fingers, and before the 
pot was emptied, the whole hand was on duty; then they 
scuffled and pushed over the liquor, like hungry swine 
over a swill bucket. I never heard any of my company 
testify upon this point, but it is the present opinion of 
the writer that he demeaned himself on the occasion 
with distinguished reservation. This much I am clear 
on, that Chisman, being the lion of the party, took two 
drinks to the other's one, which usurpation stands to his 
debit to this day. And I also remember poor little three 
hundred pounds Reuben, as he stood near by, " dumb as 
a lamb before his shearers/' to see such a rapacious onset j 
upon his pot of cabbage. He felt such assurance that it 
would be sufficient for our suppers, that when he saw it 
so hastily disappear, he was troubled about having noth- 
ing more to give us. But he did nothing more that night 
than promise that the next day we should have plenty of 
sweet potatoes and bread. A short time before daylight 
he and his party left us, and went back to their huts. 

All the following day we lay under the rock where 
Reuben put us, and got nothing more to eat till four o'clock 
in the afternoon, when Jubal brought a considerable 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



117 



quantity of roasted potatoes in his shirt bosom. At dark 
Reuben came again and brought us a little bread, saying 
''it was the last spoonful of meal he could find among 
the colored folks," and that they would draw no more 
until to-morrow afternoon. The food was dispatched al- 
most as soon as brought; and even then, when we started 
that night to penetrate the mountains, before morning we 
were very hungry, aud not a morsel in our haversacks 
but a few grains of parched corn. 

Captain Pace lived on the road yet before us, half a 
mile, and Reuben thought it judicious not to pass along 
the road by his house. We were disposed to act upon his 
suggestion, and shook farewell with our jolly friend, with 
the intention to not disturb the gallant warrior, resting 
from his labors of the night before, if possible. So we 
pulled off around the spur of the mountain until block- 
aded by ledges and laurels, then we went down in the 
valley near the road and tried it, but the briars and bushes 
confronting us there put into our minds a notion to 
take the road at all hazards by the gentleman's house. 

The Captain's house was close at hand when we stepped 
into the road, after ten o'clock. 

If any reader should ever travel the highway leading 
from Hendersonville, C, to Greenville, S. C, and 
should be on the lookout when eight miles from Saluda 
Gap, he will see on the east side, fifty yards from the road, 
an old one-story frame house, quietly going to decay, 
with a porch the full length of the front, and two or 
three log buildings on the flank; and this place he may 
write down as the residence of the chivalrous Pace. Then 
it may be of interest to stop when a half mile farther 
south, and look to the west through a narrow strip of 
shrubby timber into a field, skirted on the north by a 
branch and a range of hillocks, covered by dwarfish 
oak and chestnut, and contemplate that it was near the 



118 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



north-east corner of that field we held our first converse 
with the facetious Keuben. 

We stopped at that point several minutes to listen, but 
seeing no light and hearing no noise, we started on tip- 
toe to pass. We all chuckled considerably as we cleared 
the house and stable without disturbing even the dog, 
and leader was beginning to set his feet down with assur- 
ance, when suddenly he recoiled, even back to H$o. 2, at 
the appearance of a white man in his front not twenty 
feet away. 

So suddenly did this undesirable meeting come upon 
the leader, that he had neither time nor power to signal 
or make a flight. Meeting a white man face to face upon 
a public highway, within two hundred yards of an offi- 
cer's residence, was an event not prepared for, and. there 
was no genius in the company to extricate us from the 
difficulty. The halting in front without signal caused 
the intervals to be closed up in an instant; and there we 
stood, for something better to do, breast to back, stiff" and 
straight as four statues. The man was evidently as much 
scared as we were, for, after halting a moment in the 
road, he began to shy around u&, and shied even as far as 
the fence would let him; and when directly opposite our 
flank, and while stepping sideways, ten feet at a time, he 
stammered out spasmodically — 

"W-h-o, w-h-o a-r-e y-o-u's?" 

The leader, slowly stretching forth his hand and stick, 
like a spectre, replied in a ghostly, guttural tone — 
"M-o-v-e o-n." 

The man picked himself up like a steel trap, and I 
never saw such vigorous running but once before in my 
life, and that w T as by Good and the hounds. Slam went 
Pace's gate, bang went his door, and we never heard any- 
thing more of this stranger. It might not have been the 
veritable Captain, but from the manner he entered the 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 119 

gate and house, he must have been quite familiar with 
I the premises. And if it was, this circumstance should 
! not be taken to redound discredit upon that gentleman's 
valor, for verily, in those troubled times, to meet, at the 
hour of midnight, four men who act so strangely, is in- 
clined to "harrow up the soul" of the bravest. 

Reuben had prepared us for considerable adventure 
j that night, but for only a small portion of what was in 
store. Eight miles ahead was the Saluda Gap, which, if 
we found guarded, as was expected, we must not attempt 
I to pass. Thirteen miles ahead was Flat Rock, a famous 
watering place before the war, but at this time the hotel 
and hospital were converted into storehouses for valua- 
bles, and guarded by a company of soldiers. 

After thirty-six hours rest with Reuben, and adventure 
with Pace, we hurried on with good speed, and two hours 
and a half brought us beneath the frowning hights of 
the Saluda Mountains. The river of the same name, at 
this point, being near its source, was small, but went 
dashing and splashing along its rocky bed, more noisy 
than the Ganges. We found a bridge across the river, 
which Reuben had told us was not guarded, and having 
full confidence in the statement we ventured on and over 
it after a slight reconnoisance. But the worst had not 
yet come. At one point the road and river squeezed 
themselves, side by side, through the narrow defile in the 
mountains, and it was here that we expected trouble. 
This being about the only passable place through the 
mountains for many miles, a guard had been maintained 
here for several months, to catch refugees and deserters 
from the rebel army. Reuben had said that if we found 
| this pass guarded an attempt to go through would be 
| capture, and an attempt to go over the mountain to the 
right or to the left, would be fraught with much peril 
and hardship ; that the mountains were very steep and 



120 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



very rough and dangerous to a stranger in the night- 
time. 

" Hist ! " said leader, " isn't that a light in the road ? 99 
" It is," whispered number two. 

" Well, then, it is the guard, and what shall we do?" 
Mountains are dismal things in the night. The moun- 
taineer himself shuns them after the sun goes down. 

There they were before us, apparently half-way to 
Heaven, and forming what seemed to us at that moment 
an insurmountable wall between hope and home. We 
stood between the river and the road when we discovered 
the light. The road, after crossing the river, put off five 
or six hundred yards to meet another highway that came 
there to get through the mountains, then curved around 
to the pass and light alluded to. At the junctiom of the 
roads was somebody's store and blacksmith shop, besides 
a few residences. 

To go over the mountains, we must do one of two 
things. We must either go and recross the river at the 
bridge, and take our chances in getting over it at some 
other point, or we must go around the village and over 
the mountains to the left. As both these difficulties 
seemed fully equal to running the guard in the pass, the 
leader decided that we would reconnoiter the latter, at 
least before choosing either of the former. 

Clinging to the river, we glided like a mist up the 
bank, squatting at every roll of a pebble or crack of a 
weed. We approached within a hundred yards of the 
guard, rested on our knees, watched, listened, whispeied. 
The soldier had a little fire built against the side of the 
mountain, and was sitting very still with his back to the 
river. Leader crawled up still closer, returned and re- 
ported that in his opinion the guard was asleep — that he 
was sitting with his head resting upon his hands, his gun 
lying across his lap, and in this position he saw him ten 



J 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



121 



minutes without stirring — thought, with great Caution, 
we might slip by him. At it we went, sliding and drag- 
ging along, feeling every inch of the way for loose stones 
or dry weeds, breathing as noiselessly as the rocks, eyes 
all the time fixed upon the man that might, at one time, 
have stretched himself up and driven us through with 
his bayonet. Twenty feet from his back, and still he 
sleeps. Ten feet past him, and still he sleeps; fifty feet 
past him, and he awakes not. Up ! up on our feet, and 
we bound along that road like frightened deer for the 
next half mile. 

Safe from the principal danger, thought we, as we 
pushed on to Flat Rock, five miles distant. The moon 
came up soon after midnight, and when we got into the 
neighborhood of Flat Hock, it was well up into the 
heavens and breaking out ever and anon through the 
hurrying clouds. The spacious hotel and hospital in the 
midst of a park, we saw long before we reached it, and 
even before we saw the fire of the pickets, a considerable 
distance below, upon the appearance of which we went 
into the woods, designing to make a semi-circle of a mile 
and a half, as we had been told by Eeuben that would be 
sufficient to avoid all the pickets. At one point in the 
semi-circle we crossed a country road, and immediately 
upon passing into the woods on the other side, the two 
rear men, Chisman and Good, came running upon us in 
front, averring that we had nearly run over a picket, who 
turned and spit as they passed him in the edge of the 
woods. Chisman avers to this day that he could have 
knocked him down with his stick if he had had a mind 
to do it. We all agreed that the fellow must be a con- 
summate coward, or he would have said something as we 
passed. Perhaps we turned back into the road before we 
had gone the mile and a half as directed, although we 
did not think so then; but our anxiety to reach the 



122 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



neighborhood of Hendersonville that night, where Reu- 
ben had said we would find some negroes and food, might 
have misled our judgment. At all events we entered the 
road too soon. 

Ahead of us a short distance we at once perceived in 
the moonlight an old dilapidated building of some sort, 
setting by the read side. We stopped and listened seve- 
ral minutes, as was our custom, but upon hearing and 
seeing nothing we went along unsuspiciously in our 
regular order. By the light of the moon an object might 
be seen a considerable distance, and there were eyes upon 
us much nearer than we thought. The old building sat 
with its end to the road, and just as Leader came up with 
it — I tremble now as I tell it — out stepped four men at 
our very side. The moment our eyes fell upon them we 
saw that one had a sword at his side, and the other three 
had cartridge boxes on. Of course we all stopped me- 
chanically, for the surprise had petrified us. The man 
with the sword on, spoke : 

"Good morning, gentlemen." 

Leader responded — " Good morning, sir." 
• " Are you traveling ? " 

"Yes, sir." 

"Where are you going?" 
" Going home, sir." 
" Where do you live ? " 

"Up in the north part of Henderson county?" 
"You are soldiers, I suppose ?" 
"Yes, sir." 

"What regiment do you belong to?" 
"Eighteenth North Carolina, sir." 
" Where is your regiment now ? " 
"It's at Charleston." 

« Who's your Colonel now — I believe I don*t know ? " 

"James Dawson." 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



128 



w Were you all in the fight at Johns Island the other 
day?" 

"Yes, sir?" 

" Oh, yes, I believe your Colonel was wounded there — 
wasn't he?" 

"Well, I don't know whether you would consider him 
wounded or not; his horse was killed and fell on him 
and bruised him badly, so that he has not been on duty 
since." 

The truth was we knew as much about the Eighteenth 
North Carolina as he did, and from our prompt answers 
to his €mestions he had a mind to pass us by, but just at 
th it moment the moon glided out from under a cloud 
and betrayed us with her light, by showing Yankee 
clothes on two of the party. 

The officer, seeing the suspicious uniform, stepped up 
with "What are you doing with them blue clothes on? 
You are all d— d Yankees, and may consider yourselves 
my prisoners," at the same time drawing his sword from 
its scabbard. 

I was resigned, so was Chisman and Baker, and every- 
body else would h-ave been under the circumstances, but 
Good. He was the right man in the right place. Little 
did we think, as his short legs vexed us in the streets of 
Laurensville, or as we had often unkindly laughed at him 
about the gander, that he was yet to be the "Moses to 
lead us out of bondage." He stood behind, dumb as the 
rocks, until he saw that he was going to be surrendered, 
then he spoke up : 

"Not yet, Captain." 

Whereupon the Captain turned and flew at him with 
uplifted blade, and I was sure was going to split him 
from head to foot; but Good, undaunted, deliberately 
raised his stick to the position of guard, and not moving 
out of his tracks, continued; 



124 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



"Hold on, Captain, hold on! — you surely will not strike 
an unarmed boy?" 

The coolness of the Irishman nonplussed the Captain, 
and he turned upon his men, who were standing by with 
eyes and mouths wide open, and roared: 

« Why don't you get your guns and arrest these men, 
and not stand here like brutes?" 

Immediately the men broke into the house for their 
guns, and Good, turning about, broke back the road like 
a wild horse with parted rein. 

We all followed from instinct, if from no other cause, 
and the Captain after us in full speed, nourishing his 
blade and screaming every jump, "Halt! halt! halt!" 
But we did not halt. Over fences and fields; over logs 
and ledges, over briars and bushes, we flew, waiting not 
to listen for our pursu°rs. We had heard the negroes 
say that when the rebels got after the Union men the^ 
always run to the mountains; and we, not knowing what 
better to do, broke for one also. It was an isolated moun- 
tain, having no connection whatever with the general 
range standing off among the hills as a vidette to the 
main chain, two miles behind it, and it was two miles 
away to the southwest, but we ran to it without a single 
stop, and up its rugged side, climbing over rocks, crawl- 
ing through laurel bushes, till the very summit was 
reached, before we sat down to rest. 

It was now after three o'clock in the morning. The 
wind had raised to quite a gale, and the clouds were 
thickening up fast. We found the mountain so rough as 
to make it quite dangerous to travel, so we decided to 
wait till daylight before resuming our journey or trying 
to get off that mountain; and this latter was very desir- 
able, inasmuch as we feared the rebels might suspect we 
were on it, and come to hunt for us with dogs the follow- 
ing day. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 125 

I 

When light came, the rain was pouring down in tor- 
rents. Innumerable woody hills were spread out before 
us on every side, but no way to reach any of them with- 
out crossing open fields, and there were houses thick 
around us. To stay upon the mountain and probably be 
hunted with men and dogs, seemed too great a risk, but 
to pass away over the open plain, studded with houses, 
seemed to be a greater. 

Our dilemma was so confounding that we did not de- 
cide upon anything, but kept lingering and lingering, in 
a stupor, upon that bleak summit. It was a time when 
the stoutest heart must surrender. The elements seemed 
to be our enemies too. By ten o'clock we were as wet as 
if we had been standing in a river, and the atmosphere 
rapidly changing to cold. At eleven o'clock it was sleet- 
ing — at twelve o'clock snowing. 

0, Heaven ! what have we done that you will spread 
out, over the face of the earth, in the very midst of our 
enemies, a certain snare to our feet. Could it be possible 
that such a snow was going to fall as would make our 
further progress impossible, on account of our tracks, 
and yet it was coming down rapidly. This day culmi- 
nated our trouble, and it seemed that one feather more 
would have broken the camel's back. Hungry, wet, cold, 
driven from our course to an unknown mountain by our 
enemies; lost, and without a friend or guide, or a com- 
pass or map. We were in great distress, having been 
hungry for three days, and nothing at all to eat since the 
evening before, but a few grains of corn, and they were 
all gone long before noon, and with empty haversacks 
and heavy hearts, stood on a clift of rocks, shaking away, 
hours at a time, without speaking a word. The difficul- 
ties that now arose about us, seemed altogether insur- 
mountable. We must have food, we must have warmth, 
we must have information, and yet it seemed that we 



126 



seven Months a prisoner. 



could have nothing but capture or death. To have gone 
from our hiding place into South Carolina, and given 
ourselves up, would have been a great task, but our im- 
passionate desire to escape, fed as we approached North 
by the hope of success, made the task in Western North. 
Carolina too much to bear. Sitting by a cheerful fire, in 
a circle of friends, in the midst ot comfort and compe- 
tency, and in a time of peace, this may seem but a trifling 
occasion, for it is hard under such circumstances to con- 
ceive, even approximately, the vast extreme of human 
endurance and human distress. There are no words in 
the language that can convey a correct idea of our an- 
guish of mind and real suffering of body, on this Sun- 
day, on that North Carolina mountain. 

It did not snow lung nor much, but it grew very cold — 
so cold that the snow became so light a*nd frozen that it 
was blown like chaff' into the valley below. The wind 
blew from the northwest in tornadoes, and drove the frost 
from that side of the mountain in clouds, in our faces 
and against our backs. 

At two o'clock in the afternoon We found a shelving 
rock and crawled under it for shelter, and under it we 
got colder than before, but we lay there an hour, and 
until the fear of a freezing stupor drove us out. One of 
the party having nothing on his body but a thin blouse 
and an old pair of pants, begged for a fire to keep him 
from freezing, but the others, a little better provided, re- 
fused him by force. Then we selected a big rock, well 
covered from the valley, on the leeward side of the moun- 
tain, and ran around it rapidly until the blood ran warmer 
in our veins. 

During the day we noticed on the south side of the 
mountain, near its base, a cove, in which was a cleared off 
spot of an acre or more. From the mountain top we 
could see that this spot was cultivated, and that it had on 



l' 

SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 127 

I 

it at the time some sort of vegetation that looked like 
turnips. All day long we watched it as anxiously as if 
there had been danger of its slipping away. If the pro- 
duction were turnips, then at nightfall what pleasure we 
would have in munching our fill of that delicious vege- 
table, and such loads as we would carrv with us Would 
be amazing. These thoughts occupied much of our 
minds in the afternoon, and so much that by four o'clock 
we were half frenzied about something to eat, and it ap- 
peared that turnips were the very things we wanted most. 

Having seen no demonstrations about the mountain 
during the day that indicated search, at 4 o'clock we 
could no longer resist the temptation of descending for a 
few of those turnips, at least. Arriving within a hundred 
yards of the patch, we discovered that the crop was cab- 
bage, instead of turnips; and disappointment brooded 
over us again. But cabbage was better than nothing, 
and some of them we must have. So, three of us took 
shelter in a cluster of laurel bushes near by, while the 
Irishman sallied forth for the forage. 

He crawled along to the fence, slipped through a crack, 
into the patch, and succeeded in breaking the only knife 
blade of the party in the first cabbage stock. The ground 
was so frozen that he could not pull them out, and after 
two or three ineffectual efforts at pulling them out or 
breaking them oft", he set about the twisting process. 

By this mode he had succeeded in getting four or five 
heads ready for exportation, and was industriously en- 
gaged wringing another, when suddenly somebody shout- 
ed at him from the other side : 

"Oh, you rogue! I always thought you would steal; 
and now I know it, for we've caught you in the very act." 

Good sprang upright, whirled around, gazed, and there 
to his great confusion stood four grown ladies, on the op- 
posite side of the fence, looking directly at him* He 



128 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



abandoned his enterprise in a hurry and came tearing up 
to the laurel with a single cabbage in his hand, the wo- 
men continuing the while : 

"Yes, I would run, now I was caught — you had better 
run and beg our mercy, you rascal you," laughing heartily 
all the time. 

Good having crouched with us in the bushes, the women 
held a short conversation, and then started straight for us. 
And now was a greater dilemma than ever. If we ran, 
we would have to climb the mountain in their sight, and 
thus expose the four of us ; and if we staid there we were 
sure to come face to face with white faces, in daylight. 
We decided, however, they could do no more than tell 
on us, and they could do that in either case. Four un- 
armed women, we thought, can not capture us by force, 
and when they leave us we can run away and hide. So 
we all sat side by side, on an old log, to abide the con- 
sequences. 

Nearer and nearer they approached, pushing their way 
through the bushes, laughing and giggling as they came. 

Desperate and disconsolate we sat, like four blind owls, 
perched on our log, moving neither head nor foot. On 
they came, in their glee, peeping and prying, till they 
stepped into an avenue, a few feet away, and looked 
squarely at us. Then they quickly turned and began a 
hasty retreat. They evidently expected to see some ac- 
quaintance, but instead thereof saw four as strange, hag- 
gard, ugly, repulsive looking men as could well be imag- 
ined. Subsequent events proved that they took Good for 
one of the neighbor boys who was hiding out in the 
mountains to keep out of the rebel army. 

Desiring to allay their fear, if possible, we called after 
them. 

"Halloo ! girls ; don't be scared — we are probably more 
your friends than you think." 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



129 



They answered, "Who are you?" 
"We are soldiers." 
"What kind of soldiers?" 
"Confederate soldiers, of course." 

"Yes fighting for that miserable old scamp of a Jeff. 
Davis, are you? You ought to be ashamed of yourselves." 
"Why ought we to be ashamed?" 

"There is why enough. The old rascal fetched this 
on the country. The Yankees didn't want war at all." 

"Well, if the Yankees didn't want war, what made 
! them come down here to invade our homes and steal our 
niggers?" 

"Why, they just came down to whip you rebels — that's 
all they came for — and they are going to do it, too." 

"Why, do you think we should be so cowardly as to 
' stay at home and see the Yankees overrun our country, 
burn our houses, steal our horses and negroes, insult our 
women, and such like, without taking up arms against 
them?" 

"They ain't doing any such, thing ; they aint running 
over the country half fast enough, or burning half houses 
enough to suit me. I'd like to see the Yankees coming 
this very minute, I'd risk their burning our house,, and 
stealing our horses and negroes." 

"Can it be possible that such beautiful girls as you, in 
old North Carolina, are in sympathy with the Yankees?" 

"It can be. possible that such ugly girls as we, in old 
North Carolina, are not in sympathy with the hateful 
rebels who hide around to- kill our brothers because they 
won't fight for them." 

A ray of hope flashed upon us. We were now in that 
; country where Union people were said to abound, and these 
girls, notwithstanding our many efforts to draw from 
: them expressions to the contrary, so boldly asserting their 
9 



130 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



full sympathy with the Federal arms, gave us assurance 
enough to break to them our secret. 

"You say you like the Yankees?" 

"Yes." * 

"And would like to see them?" 
"Yes." 

"Well, then " said one of us, "look here, upon this log 
— look at us from head to foot, and you will see four live 
and as full-blooded Yankees as are found anywhere. We 
are four Yankee prisoners, who have escaped from the 
rebels at Columbia, and are trying to make our way to 
the Federal lines at Knoxville. We are now lost, nearly 
frozen and nearly starved, and if you are the friend to 
Yankees you appear to be, we humbly beg to become the 
objects of your charity." 

"Law, Juan," said Florence, the youngest, a sweet, mod- 
<est maiden of sixteen summers, "I'll bet these are the 
same men that Captain Henry was telling us about to-day 
at dinner. Did you all talk with anybody last night at 
Flat Rock?" 

"We talked with some men, over on the road some 
place." 

"And been on this mountain all the time since?" 
"Yes." 

"Why they think you are here, and there have been 
men hunting and watching for you all day, and the Cap- 
tain eat dinner at our house to-day." 

By this time they had returned to the bushes, even to 
the log upon which we sat, and extended to us their hands 
of friendship and rfidelity. The greeting they gave us 
was enough, for there is a language in the shaking of 
hands that carries with it more meaning, and less deceit 
than any articulate sounds. If the heart is warm- 
rand full of kind and r generous, feeling which it wishes tc? 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



131 



reciprocate, it will generally tell you so by the earnest 
manner in which the hand is grasped, 

$ever before did I see such unmistakable evidence of 
sympathy and friendship, as gushed from those rustic 
faces. Had they been as mute as the trees around, we 
would willingly have placed our case in their hands. 

"You say you are very hungry," added Juan, with a 
significant look at Florence, who sprang away like an 
arrow down the mountain, over rocks and logs, through 
brash and bushes she bounded like a stricken doe, and 
was in a few moments lost to sight. 

While Florence was gone Juan, who principally did 
the talking, proceeded to tell us, first, how we were beset 
with dangers, and how she thought she could extricate 
us. If we would entirely submit our case into her hands, 
do just as she directed, in all things, she would under- 
take to lead us from the mountain and conceal us until 
she could find a guide to go with us to Knoxville: that 
she had had much experience in hiding her brother and 
other friends, and knew no doubt, much more about what 
was necessary, and where to put us, than we; and that 
she could not undertake it it there was to be any conflict 
of authority ; that she would imperil their safety by taking 
curs in charge; that they were surrounded by rebels, and 
already suspicioned of being decidedly in sympathy with 
the Federal Government, and watched by every rebel m 
the neighborhood. 

We did not hesitate to answer them that we placed the 
entire matter in their charge, and that we would not ex- 
ercise any will of our own, without their direction or ap- 
proval. 

Florence in the meantime, had returned to us with a 
basket of provisions, which, though homely, I remember 
as being the most delicious food that was ever my fortune 
to eat, especially the corn cakes, in a triangular shape, 



132 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



about two inches thick, and jet a little warm from dinner, 
when laid open and liberally spread with butter and mo- 
lasses, were good enough even tor Cleopatra. And the 
large red apples, large as a tin cup, that Florence passed 
us, in her apron, were of such a quality that none but 
starving men can fully appreciate. 

After a stay of nearly an hour, the girls left us, with 
the understanding that they were to return again at dark 
and take us from that mountain, to some better and more ' I 
comfortable place of concealment. 

! 



CHAPTER Tl. 

THE WOMEN OF NORTH CAROLINA WAITING FOR GUIDES — THE 

CANDY PULLING THE OLD GOSSIPS — MORE FEMALE STRAT- 
EGY ADIEUS AMONG THE ROBBERS THEIR MURDERS 

THEIR CAVE THEIR ENGAGEMENT WITH US — -WHY THEY HAD 

TO TARRY THE EXPEDITION TO DR. THE CAPTURE 

OF ONE OF THE VANCES OUR HURRIED DEPARTURE CROSS- 
ING THE FRENCH BROAD RIVER — GOOD AND HIS PONE — < 

BANKS BURTON'S — 'HIS NEIGHBORS AND FAMILY AMONG THE 

MOUNTAINS THE OBSTINACY OF OUR GUIDES THE MAJES- 
TY OF MOUNT PISGAH ABANDONED BY OUR GUIDES LN THE- 

WILD MOUNTAINS. 

We were much relieved by this accidental meeting. 
.No one of our party was unkind enough to entertain even 
a thought of infidelity in the girls. Their manner of ex- 
pression and action, though not half so emphatic and full 
of show as better educated folks, } et they had in them 
such simplicity, such naturalness, such freedom from de- 
ceit, that every word they uttered was believed. 

So, we had really found the "good Union people" of 
JMorth Carolina, to whom we had looked with so much 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 183 

hope. The clouds of difficulty that had gathered about 
us that day, so thick aud dreadful, were but the darkness 
preceeding the light of the morning. We considered no 
probabilities, felt no scruples, but awaited as confidently 
the return of our benefactress, as the child would wait for 
its mother. 

A little after dark, two of the girls came slipping noise- 
lessly up the mountain. They had arranged to take us 
to the garret of their dwelling , and told us this kind of ^ 
story about their old father: Said he was an old man, and 
loved the Union, but they lived in a rebel neighborhood 
and were tenants to a rebel landlord; that he had been 
two or three times arrested upon suspicion of harboring 
rebel deserters and refugees, and if anything should come 
of our concealment in their house, they much desired that 
their father be able to swear that he knew nothing at all 
about it, and in view of these facts they would enjoin upon 
us the most perfect quiet when he was about the house. 

A reasonable story ; and We believed it at the time, but 
it afterwards came to our knowledge, by third parties, that 
their father was a bitter rebel. 

Juan instructed us that we should follow thirty paces 
behind her and her sister, and if we heard a certain sig- 
nal from her, as, "Who are youT all must quickly hide. 

Down the mountain we crept, shivering and shaking 
with the cold. Over the fence into the field, stooping 
forward, by the direction of Juan, so that the fence would 
cover us, we thus hurried across, to an old stable filled 
with fodder, and perhaps a hundred yards from tha house. 
In the corner of this stable we crouched, and the girls, 
calling up Tige, their fierce dog, hastened into the house 
with him. 

Another moment and fieet-footed Florence came trip- 
ping to us with the unwelcome intelligence, that a com- 



234 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



pany of neighbors, all rebels, were in the house, and that 
we would have to remain yet a little longer in the fodder. 

Another few minutes and Florence came gliding in 
again, like a spirit, with a pot of rye coffee she had man- 
aged to make. After having drank the hot coffee, we 
really seemed colder than before. We were so exceed- 
ing chilled that our teeth pounded each other till our very 
jaws ached. Chisman afterwards affirmed to the girls 
that he had to stick his head in a crack of the stable to 
keep his jaws from shaking out his teeth. 

Soon after Florence went back, the old dog got out of 
the house and set up a fearful barking and snuffing of 
the air, in the direction of our retreat. Their father and 
Juan came rushing out of the house at the same time, the 
father remarking: 

"Juan, what in the world can this dog be barking at 

30?" 

"Oh," said she, "I guess he^s only mad because some- 
body has turned him out into the cold — it's too bad for 
the old fellow to have to stay out all this cold night — so, 
Tige, come back into the house — poor fellow," and they 
all walked in together. 

The girls seemed much more exercised for our comfort 
than we were ourselves. In fact our prospects had been 
so improved under the new dispensation, that we came 
near forgetting that we were cold. 

About ten o'clock Caroline came to us and said they 
had arranged to take us into the house at once, as their 
visitors would probably stay till midnight; that when we 
heard them commence singing at the house, we must pull 
of! our boots and slip, one at a time, to the house, and up 
stairs and into the left hand room as quietly as possible, 
and should they suddenly hush singing, if any one was com- 
ing he must retreat again to the stable. We pulled off 
our boots and made ourselves ready for the signal. 



i 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



135 



Soon there broke from the house such a strain of mel- 
odies as is never heard away from the mountains, loud, 
clear and vigorous, ringing and swelling out upon the air 
like the chiming of bells in a steeple, the words chosen 
being Mr. Hart's old familiar hymn, "Come, you sinners, 
poor and needy." One by one we shot up to the house, 
and as I bounded along, I could but smile to hear the 
words of the old song, never before appreciated^ and 
which seemed fully as appropriate to the occasion as true. 
Up tbe stairs we went, and into the room as directed, and 
there, "God bless the women, every one," in the absence 
of a stove, sat a big iron kettle full of hot coals. As soon 
as we were housed above, one of the girls sang out, in the 
hall below: 

"Oh, let's quit this; it's so cold it don't pay, unless the 
folks would give more attention to us;' 7 and into the 
room they broke, complaining and scolding their visitors 
for their indifference to a nice serenade. 

Our room was small and close, and the kettle of coals 
soon made it comfortable. Down upon the floor we sat, 
around the kettle, as noiseless as could be desired. 

So far so good, and our sad condition a few hours be- 
fore was past ameliorating, though it was hard for us to 
appreciate that we were still among our enemies and yet 
among our friends; that many of the hearts of that Sun- 
day night party, making merry below, would be appalled 
if they knew that four Yankees rested above them in 
the same house; and yet four of them, ostensibly the 
merriest of all, were in painful suspense for the rest to 
go home, that they might resume their ministrations of 
mercy. 

Fun went on down stairs till after eleven o'clock before 
the neighbors took their leave. Then in a few minutes 
the girls came tearing up stairs as if to bed, blustered 
around awhile in their own chamber, then came tip-toe- 



136 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



ing it in their stocking feet into ours. Also in their old 
mother's heart the germ of loyalty was still quick and 
green, and when she saw their father in bed she too slip- 
ped up stairs, squeezed our hands, bade us welcome to 
her house, and went down to bed. 

The four girls sat up with us an hour later, and you 
timid Indiana girls will not believe me, perhaps, when I 
say that after midnight two of them walked alone, three 
miles and back, through the wild woods, in quest of the 
guides they had promised us. 

This is one of many examples we saw there of what 
woman can perform when she has a mind to do and a 
heart to brave. Think of it, philanthropic ladies of In- 
diana ! How many of you so loved the late soldiers that 
you would dare the midnight ghosts and freezing ele- 
ments for two hours, as these two did, in a country beset 
with robbers and rebels, for the mere accommodation of 
four strange, unseemly men, and that, too, without a re- 
quest ? How many of you would assume the danger of 
being locked up in jail, or banished from your homes in 
order to protect and conceal four men, bound to you with 
no stronger ties than the common relation we all bear to 
our Creator? How many of you would be willing to lay 
aside your flowers or your embroidery to go into the 
woods to cut and haul wood, or to make rails to fence a 
field the enemy had laid waste, or to plow or to sow 
wheat, or to harvest, or to carry a half bushel of corn or 
wheat on your shoulder five miles to mill, and then hav- 
ing baked it into bread, carry it the same distance after 
dark to your father, husband, or brother, who was hiding 
out in the mountains, living in caves to keep out of the 
rebel army, and from fighting against a government he 
loved? Yet the loyal North Carolina women, created in 
the same likeness and strength, ^during the war did all 
these things, and more, without a murmur. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



137 



Juan said of the guides they expected to find us : 
"Gentlemen, they are bad men, at least they are so re- 
garded by both rebels and Unionists ; they have the reputa- 
tion of killing many people and robbing many more; they 
have been declared outlaws by the proper authorities, 
and one thousand dollars reward offered for their arrest. 
They have been several times through the mountains to 
Knoxville, and are well acquainted with the way, besides 
they will be as cautious, on account of their own safety, 
as anybody in whose care you can be placed. But you 
should never be captured with them; their lives are for- 
feited, and it would not be wise for you to consider your 
lives worth anything if found in the company of Jack 
and Jerry Vance." 

As soon as the girls came into our room, they blinded 
the single window with a heavy quilt and lighted a can- 
dle. I at once looked pryingly around for a way to the 
garret or closet, and seeing none, I turned and whispered 
to J uan : 

""Why, certainly, this cannot be that fine place to hide 
you spoke about?" 

"Now, sir," she replied, a little jocosely, "ask no more 
questions about that, if you please ; we understand that 
you have submitted that matter altogether to us." 

Feeling a little rebuked, I said no more upon that sub- 
ject. 

There was a bed in this room, the stead being very 
plain, with a. staff set in the top of each post, extending 
up near the ceiling, and over the top of which staffs was 
stretched a sheet of white muslin, so near the color and 
lying so near the plastering, that it required a close look 
to discover it. I, however, noticed it, and fostered a lurk- 
ing suspicion that that sheet had something to do in our 
concealment. Time wore on in general conversation till 
Juan spoke : 



138 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



"Mary, come here/' and they took hold of the ends of 
the bed and slid it along the floor, and which carried the 
sheet along and uncovered a snug little scuttle hole lead- 
ing to the garret, They then explained the arrangement. 
It had been prepared entirely by their own hands to con- 
ceal their brother from the rebel conscripting officers, 
and in which they succeeded for nine weeks, when the 
confinement became so unbearable that he came out of 
his own accord, and gave himself up and went to the 
army, preferring it to garret life or roaming in the moun- 
tains. 

Mary, springing upon the bed, reached into the garret 
and drew therefrom a light ladder, and made it ready for 
our ascent, Then said she, "If you will go up that ladder 
you will find a bed made down for you, with, perhaps, 
plenty of cover." We went up, drew the ladder after us 
and back went the sheet again over the hole. Above we 
found a comfortable bed, made for the occasion, and slept 
soundly the balance of the night, 

The next morning, when their father had gone to his 
work, the girls came again up stairs, and after a little 
preparation below, again removed the sheet and invited 
us out of the garret. When we went down we found a 
kettle of fresh coals, some water and towels, and a good 
breakfast smoking upon the table. 

It was now that we learned that the two girls who had 
been in search of our guides had failed to find them, but 
had learned that they were at the time out of the county, 
and would not return for three or four days, and may be 
a week. Their friends, however, had sent us assurance 
that the boys would undertake to guide us to Knoxville, 
if we would wait till they came back. So stay right there 
we must was the order, and we rather liked the plan 
since we had to be delayed. 

For four days and nights we remained in that house, 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 1B9 ; 

staying the most of the time by day in the room we first 
entered, unless their father or some rebel visitor was 
about the house ; then we were sent to the garret. 

The girls, like most of their gender, could not keep 
their secret. Every Union girl for miles around, and 
there were a good many, had intelligence of us in twenty- 
four hours, and they were curious there as here. A new 
one was coming in almost every hour to see that wonder- 
ful creature, a live Yankee. And one man, who had for 
many years been a cripple, and whose heart had remained 
right, was also brought in to have a "little talk." This 
gentleman, as well to show his hospitality as to sharpen 
up our wits and loosen up our tongues, carried in with 
him a bottle of North Carolina Tonic, which, in justice 
to the occasion, I must say went not away dishonored. 
It was this man who first leaked out the secret that the 
father of the girls was a rebel in principle, and a bitter 
one at that. 

Unfortunately for the family they had had no advan- 
tages in education, and no one of them could read or 
write. They had a good many absent friends, and among 
them an only brother and two brothers-in-law in the rebel 
army. They required of us to write for them a letter to 
every one, and read one they had had from their brother 
nearly two weeks. 

Out of this letter writing liked to have come trouble,, 
but only came another example of their ready sagacity 
and invention. One morning after their father had gone ? 
as we all thought, to haul wood for an ex-Confederate 
cabinet officer, I bad occasion to go down stairs after a 
bottle of ink that I knew to be there; and while return- 
ing, and about half way up the stairs, some one opened 
the door behind me, and supposing it one of the girls I 
stopped and looked round, and, to my great surprise, saw 
their father face to face. One more bound and I was at 



140 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



the top of the stairs, and into the room, full of per- 
plexity. 

The old man, going into the room below, asked, 
"Juan, what man was that I saw going up stairs?" 

Juan broke out into a violent laugh, in which her 
mother and sister joined, and replied, "Why that was 
nobody but Florence; she put on a suit of Dave's clothes 
to haul wood in, and ran up stairs when she saw you 
coming." 

They effectually laughed the old man into the belief 
that it was Florence, and soon he went off, giving himself 
no further trouble ahout it. 

On the fourth day of our stay with these good people, 
the sister of our expected guides came over and told us 
that her brothers had returned, and that they would see 
us that night in the mountains, and that she and her lady 
friend had come to lead us to them. A very foolish no- 
tion took possession of our girls and these two, for they 
held that we should not leave their house without some 
kind of social frolic, and the}' had decided on a candy 
pulling. We did not like the idea, but raised no serious 
objection. 

Accordingly when night came they built up two big 
fires below, one in each room, put on a gallon of sorghum, 
and thus began the preliminaries. . 

About this time there appeared at the gate an old wo- 
man, a perfect old gossip, who, from reputation, was 
never happy only when talking of the adversity of some 
of her neighbors. A regular run -about-e very where-and- 
tattle; and she was a rebel, too. The old woman walked 
into the house and very sedately began to inquire about 
the health ®f a little grandchild in the family. 

"Sick!"' 

" Yes ; aint Jakey sick ? " 

Its mother, suspecting somebody had been lying to the 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



141 



old woman, to settle her curiosity, began: "Well, I do 
declare, grandmother, there is something remarkable 
about Jakey; this afternoon about four o'clock he got 
right up out of the cradle, and has been running around 
ever since, as if nothing had ever been the matter with 
him. Did you ever hear tell of the like, grandmother ? 
I am really scared about him. 7 ' 

The old woman examined the child's pulse, pronounced 
it very unnatural, said he had some fever, and looked so 
bad; while in truth the child had not been sick a mo- 
ment in a month. It was all explained when Elizabeth 
Yance told how the old woman had asked her and Ma- 
tilda Pewitt what they were running over to so 

much for, and that she had told her that little Jakey was 
very sick. 

She had come to stay all night with the sick, and much 
trouble she gave to the girls in their candy pulling. She 
insisted on staying in the room with them, rather than 
go into the other room where the old folks were. She 
wanted to see if they pulled candy now, like they did 
when she was a girl. She hadn't seen the like for sb long. 
But the girls, getting a little vexed at her perverseness, 
plainly asked her to go into the other house, as they 
wished to have a little private fun of their own. 

This was a triumph, and they soon had us below, the 
door locked, the window blinded, one of the girls on 
picket outside, and the wax sticking to every finger in 
I the room. We pulled so much Sorghum wax at Col- 
umbia, that we were adepts in the business. The science 
with which we jerked it was astonishing to the girls ; but 
when Chisman, in showing them a touch of a Columbia 
professionalist, got a half pound of soft wax 3 in his hair, I 
thought Florence would go into spasms. 

It was the desire to keep our fun quiet, but sufficient 
noise reached the ears of the unwelcome visitor in the 
other room to arouse her suspicion, and she inquired if 



142 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



she did not hear men's voices somewhere. Our good 
mother assured her that she heard nothing but the girls, 
■and then stepped out into the yard to tell the picket to 
caution us to be stiller. The caution was communicated, 
but we soon forgot it, and made perhaps more noise than 
before. Again we were heard by the old gossip, and again 
she declared that she heard men's voices, and that she 
was going in the other room to see if there were not some 
at the candy party. The mother begged her not to do it, 
that it would make the girls mad, she knew, if she dis- 
turbed them in their fun. Again the sentinel was visited, 
and instructed to advise us to depart, for the old woman 
would surely find us out soon if that noise prevailed. 

Immediately, upon this intelligence, We dropped our 
eandy and began preparations to leave our benefactresses* 

I shall never forget that parting. It was not in tears^ 
nor in multitudinous acknowledgments, but there was a 
gratitude felt and a sympathy reciprocated that marks 
but few occasions. They had found us in the last mo- 
ments of expiring hope. They had attended us for four 
days with more than sisterly care, and had rebuilt us with 
a new life and a new hope. All that we left in return, or 
eould leave, was a written certificate of their treatment, 
signed with our names in full, and rank, to show our sol- 
diers, if they ever came among them, that they were 
friendly to our cause even when the rebels were in power. 

Elizabeth Vance and her cousin, who had come to con- 
duct us to the guides, led off toward the Blue Ridge. The 
excitement created by our debut at Flat Rock having now 
subsided, it was not thought necessary by our guides to 
observe special caution, as our way lay over an unfre- 
quented trail through the woods. In fact we had no time 
to look or listen if we kept up with the girls, for they 
hurried along with a speed I never could understand* 
They could jump a bigger branch and walk a smaller log 
than any of us ; could get up a clift or over a fence while 
we would be studying how* 



seven Months a prisoner. 



143 



It took ns but a few minutes to get over the three miles 
that brought us to the foot of the Blue Bidge, and to the 
place where we expected to find Jack and Jerry Vance. 
It was in the angle of intersecting roads, fast asleep upon 
their guns, under an oak tree, that we found them. As 
we approached near, rustling the leaves a little, they both 
instantly sprang to their feet, with their guns in their 
hands, and in a coarse voice commanded: "Halt! Who 
comes there ?" 

Their sister's voice was satisfactory. 

If any reader should be curious to know the general 
appearance of these men, I would say, first fix in your 
mind an untutored man, thirty-five years old, standing 
six feet high, in a suit of coarse home-made jeans; his 
skin dark, but not as dark as his long hair that grew down 
almost to his eyes, nor as dark as his beard that covered 
most of his face; his black eyes set deep in his head, un- 
der a pair of heavy, closely knitted brows, and though 
seldom fixed directly at you, his glare when it did come 
was withering. Now fix his wool hat all full of holes, 
and his Springfield rifle bright as steel can be laying 
across his left arm with his right hand hold of the hammer 
and trigger, and it will do for the form of Jerry Vance. 

Then a younger man, but twenty-one years old with 
shorter hair, beardless, and in most ways a more honest 
looking man than his brother ; more stoutly built though 
not so tall, a milder eye, a more intelligent look, and but 
for his talk you would fail to take him for as bad a man 
as he is ; and this will be enough to sjy to gather the 
outlines of Jack Vance. 

When we went up they spoke not a word to us, but 
sharply said ; 

" Liz., who are these men you bring here ?" 

" Why, Jerry, these are the Yankees who have been 
over at — these four days." 

" How in the do you know they are Yankees ?" 

" Say," turning to us now, u we want to know just who 
you are, and how you came in this country ?" 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



We, a little agitated, proceeded to give him the facts. 

" Were you ever in the rebel service F 

"No." 

"Where do you live ?" and so on through a most rigid 
examination, then extending his gun he added: "Lay 
your hands upon this gun and swear that you have told 
me the truth in every syllable, or we'll shoot you upon 
the spot." — Clap went four hands down upon the cold 
steel. — " You swear that you have told us the truth in all 
things, and this you do on the penalty of being shot the 
moment we find out to the contrary ?" 

" Girls, go home — meet us at the Devil's Boot at sun up 
in the morning with breakfast for six. Jack, give these 
men a drink from the canteen. Strangers, sit down by 
this tree and tell us what you want." 

Having received such uniform kind words and kind 
treatment from our female friends, this unexpected sever- 
ity made us all devoutly wish that we had never seen the 
Vances, and we came near being unkind enough to blame 
those who had placed us in their hands. They looked so 
much like rebel soldiers with their guns in their hands, ; 
and they talked so much like our first captors, and then 
it was painfully evident that they were not much inter- 
ested in our behalf. 

Negotiations began at once, which in an hour resulted 
in a contract that they should guide us to Knoxville, 
nearly two hundred miles by the mountains, for four hun- 
dred dollars, payable in gold and silver. We acquiesced 
in the price mucfe sooner than in the delay of a week, 
which they thought probably necessary for them to make 
ready for the expedition. We could imagine but little 
cause of delay in men of their reputed occupation — hiding 
from the rebels — and the uncertainty they expressed as 
to the time they would be able to start was altogether 
unsatisfactory, but as there seemed no alternative we 
agreed to wait. 

When a full understanding was reached it was one 
o'clock in the morning, and it being cold and frosty we 



SlVEN MONlHS A PRISONER. 



145 



yet walked two miles to somebody's stable loft where we 
all slept till the chickens began crowing for day, then we 
crawled out, haying first turned the hay over to leave no 
sign, and wended our way two and a half miles up into 
the mountain to the Devil's Boot, where we were to have 
our breakfasts. 

About the appointed hour, Elizabeth, with two or three 
neighbor girls, came to us in accordance with orders, 
with a bountiful supply of provision. Their mother came 
to us about noon, and she was our frequent visitor during 
the three days that we staid in the neighborhood. She 
was much pleased in the arrangement we had made with 
her boys, for she had long been urging them to go to 
Knoxville to spend the winter; said she saw no chance 
for them to stay at home and escape capture on account 
of the snow. It was from her that we learned more about 
her boys than from any body else. Their life at the time 
was something of this nature : They both had deserted 
places in the rebel armj^, and it one day leaked out acci- 
dentally that Jack had also but recently deserted the 
, Union army, the Second -North Carolina, recruited at 
Knoxville. They had now resolved to turn the war to 
their advantage, to use their own words, since they were 
driven from their domestic pursuits by rebels they would 
make rebels pay their wages. Six others, similarly cir- 
cumstanced, were acting with them in their work and de- 
fense. They expressed the most inveterate hate for 
rebels, and whether true or false, scrupulously regarded 
| every man a rebel who had valuables. They now lived 
I ^>n spoils, or rather hoped to live on them, for it was the 
DUsiness of the gang to roam the country over for many 
rules, sacking every " fine house," and it was on an expe- 
iition of this sort that they were absent when we first 
net the girls in the mountain. (Something to eat was the 
j east consideration, as they only occasionally took a ham 
br some luxuries. Money was their principal object, but 
hey never left behind jewelry and silver ware — of the 
fatter they had accumulated an abundance, from tea- 
10 



146 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



spoons to milk pitchers, the value of which I can give no 
estimate, but they always spoke of it as a life-time com- 
petency when they should find a market. They had a 
cave in the mountains, where they staid in bad weather, 
and where they stored their plunder ; and to look around 
the dingy walls of that damp den, and see here and there 
suspended on a stick in a crevice, collections of costly 
service, all cankered and black, you could hardly believe 
that they were but a short time ago the dazzling splendor 
of hospitable boards. But the strangest thing was the 
life-size oil painting of Washington that stood in one end, 
which was really worth a hundred dollars, but which 
could have been bought from the present, owners for fifty 
cents. When asked what they wanted with such property 
as that, they answered : 

" We found the old gentlemen in the society of rebels, 
and we thought he would be happier in the cave of a 
Union man than in the parlor of a rebel." 

They had lived in the mountains for two years, except- 
ing the three months that Jack had spent in the Union 
army at Knoxville, and they had not slept in a house or 
eaten from a table in the time — regular wild men — mak- 
ing their shoes in the mountains for themselves and 
friends out of leather they had stolen from the tanner. 

There were many such gangs as this in the mountain 
districts of the South during the war ; or, not exactly such 
gangs, but men who banded together and lived in the 
mountains to keep out of the rebel army. Generally 
these gangs were composed of as loyal, generous-hearted, 
honest men as the country has in it — men with a common 
cause and a common aim, never in feuds nor crimes, but 
homogeneous and harmonious as a brigade, collecting 
together occasionally for a more powerful defense. 

But this was not the case with the Yance gang. They 
were at war with all the rest. Their depredations were 
so notorious that the rebel authorities had published a 
solemn proclamation of out-lawry against them, as wel ] 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



147 



as increase their force and diligence against all other men 
who were lying out in the mountains. 

Thus, by the outrages of this gang, the good men who 
were dodging from the army, out of loyal and patriotic 
motives, were much more harrassed than they would have 
been, and a united effort in the neighboring gangs to 
restrain them in their lawlessness, had resulted in a brisk 
skirmish, but a few weeks before we saw them, in which 
one of the gang had been badly wounded. 

Like us, the mother of Jerry and Jack, could not under- 
stand what business they had that need delay them a 
week. She knew of no business they had but to eat, sleep 
and hide. But the boys insisted that they had something 
to arrange. So anxious were we to be off, and so much 
concerned was their mother about their safety, that we 
jointly besieged them, night and day, to go or tell the 
cause of delay. 

Jerry, the second day, a little bit fretted, said, " Well, if 

you must know the reason, it is this : Dr. has got 

one hundred and two dollars in silver, and I'll be if I 

leave this part of the country till we get it. The Dr. is 
not home now, and will probably not be back for a week." 

This explanation was not satisfactory to us. We held a 
little conference aside and decided to put an end to the 
delay by increasing their compensation one hundred and 
two dollars. It took as but a moment to decide upon- 
this ; and if the sum had been a thousand dollars, it would 
have been as readily pledged. Time had no measure of 
value with us then ; the pressure of circumstance was SO' 
great that every penny we could command, or could hope 
to command upon our arrival at Knoxville, would have 
been pledged, no doubt, for a single twenty-four hours. 

But our spirits fell again, when Jerry rejected our 
proposition, saying that they had their minds made up 
about the silver, and would not change them, and when 
J we grew perhaps a little importune in the matter, the same 
man very ungenerously replied, "if you men can't wait till 
| we get ready to go, I advise you to put on at once with- 



148 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



out us." Only that there was no alternative, we consented 
to wait. Yes, wait, and to appear a little more patient in 
it, too, for we could see clearly through their careless 
and crusty answers, that they were not the least enthusi- 
astic in their engagement with us, and our fears were, 
that if they had but little discouragement, they would 
abandon it. So, after this interview, we at once became 
complaisant — yes, radically so — never disputed with them 
any more, and actually studied their pleasure with care, 
as much to keep them in the notion of Knoxville, 
as to keep their good will. And this latter was by no 
means undesirable, for, notwithstanding their extreme 
abuse of rebels, we were just about as afraid of them as 
we were of the rebel soldiers. 

Matters went on tediously enough till the third day? 
about noon, when the news reached us, through Elizabeth, 
that the subject of our delay had returned home. Con- 
sequently Jerry sent Jack to the top of a mountain to 
fire two shots, one from a musket and one from a rifle, 
which was the signal for the assembling of the gang at 
the cave. 

The first one to report, about the middle of the after- 
noon, was Sain Johnson, a man of thirty, wearing a cap 
made by himself from a red fox skin, with the full tail 
hanging down behind. Soon afterwards came Dick Dun- 
can and Tim Tansell. I pitied bright-eyed, innocent- 
looking young Duncan, who evidently belonged to better 
society, and to a more honest business, but I never had a 
doubt that coarse, orangoutang-looking Tim Tansell was 
not in his natural element. If stealing is innate in anybody, 
there could have been nothing abnormal about this man's 
tendencies, for no one with honest instincts could put on 
such a hideous costume as he had the courage to wear. 
On his head he wore a striped turban, rolled up all round, 
and a half dozen long, black chicken feathers set in the 
top. His coat, or jacket, was made out of the skin of a 
bear dressed with the hair on, and so arranged that the 
fore legs formed the sleeves and the paws the cuffs, hang" 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



149 



ing down over the hands, showing the claws of the verit- 
able animal. Around the irregular collar, and gathered 
into a great bow-knot in front, was bound the unseemly 
spotted skin of a rattlesnake. 

Mike Hedge and Jim Beck sat down with us about 
five o'clock, but it was sun down before Gus Ives got in. 
They all carried their guns and some articles of dress that 
would change their general appearance. 

The object of the summons was soon explained to be 
Dr. 's SI 02 of silver, and met with the hearty concur- 
rence of every one present. 

But there was one thing we did not all agree to, and that 
was the request they made of us four, to take guns and 
go with them. Against this we protested most earnestly. 
We had in us no spirit for pillage. We felt no desire for 
the romance of robbing, and, probably, murdering ; and 
our zeal in begging was all the more animated when 
they brought out four rusty guns and said we had to go. 
Young Duncan was enlisted in our behalf, and urged 
upon his companions the injustice and impropriety of 
making us go against our will; said we could very truly 
have no interest in the matter — that we could not wish to 
punish and rob a man that had done us no harm ; that 
there were plenty of them for the work, and it was un- 
necessary as it was unjust to impose upon us the hazard 
of the outlaw's penalty by engaging in that expedition. 
His timely intercessions succeeded in having us excused 
from going, but did not protect us from a most intolerant 
abusing, and unwarranted insinuations that we were 
rebel spies. One man was detailed to stay with us, and at 
dark the other seven men, blacked and munled, were, on 
their way to Dr. 's. 

The result of the expedition we have only from them, 
as gathered from a random conversation among themselves 
next morning These are about the facts, as we understood 
them. When they reached the house of the Dr., he 
and his family were still sitting around the fire, unsus- 
pectingly enough. The ruffians marched up near the 



150 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



window and, without the least notice, fired a full volley 
directly into the family circle ; then charged into the 
house with empty guns. Fortunately no one was hit, and 
more fortunately still, the Doctor had escaped by running 
out the back way into the woods. Upon entering, they 
found none but the wife and three daughters, in mortal ter- 
ror, and answering that the old gentleman was not about 
the house, they proceeded to ransack it from cellar to gar- 
ret. Under the beds, up stairs, they found three negro 
men concealed, as much frightened as the ladies. Satis- 
fied that the doctor was not about the house, they then 
took their rope which they had for the purpose, and tied it 
around the wife's neck and threatened to hang her if some 
of them did not tell where the hundred and two dollars 
in silver was. In this they failed, but only abandoned 
their inhuman treatment after one or two of the girls had 
fainted with fright. 

Having failed to get the money, they were determined 
they would not fail in their barbarous fun, so they 
brought in the three negro men, whom they had taken 
from under the bed, in the sitting room, in the presence 
of the ladies, and made one pat and the other two dance 
for their amusement. As cruel as was the treatment, it 
was hard to prevent a smile to hear those wild men talk 
about how they made those negroes dance for their lives. 
They made them dance with all their energies, for a 
straight hour, without one moment's cessation, and when 
from exhaustion they would moderate their activity a 
little, the heartless bystanders would bring down their 
guns and command them to " go into it, or we'll shoot 
you in a minute." Thus they kept him at it, till they 
both sunk to the floor. Tired of this, they plundered the 
bureau and cupboard and retired. 

Early next morning Dr. , hied off to Henderson- 

ville and told the story of his outrage to the commander 
of a regiment of militia stationed there, whereupon the 
entire regiment was transported in wagons, in great haste, 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



151 



to our community to hunt out the offenders. The first 
we knew of this movement was about eleven o'clock in 
the morning. At this time we were impatiently lounging 
on the side of the mountain, near the cave, waiting for a 
decision from onr guides, now that they had failed in 
their attempt to get the silver, when we saw the mother 
coming running towards the cave without bonnet and 
with disheveled hair, crying and calling Jerry. The mi- 
litia had made a coup de main into that vicinity and had 
really captured their brother, living four miles off, and 
had tied him, hands and feet, and thrown him into a 
wagon like a hog, to be hauled to execution at Hender- 
sonville. 

The event was probably a lucky one for us, for it fright- 
ened the boys, and from the outcries of the mother, they 
consented to start at once for Knoxville, or as soon as 
they could possibly get provisions enough for the trip, 
which would require ten days. The mother gave direc- 
tions to be ready to start at three o'clock in the evening, 
and to go at onoe two miles further into the mountains 
to a certain "cove," and that she would get the help of 
her neighbors and meet us in the cove at the appointed 
time, with all the provisions that we required. 

After making some hasty dispositions about the cave, 
and hiding their favorite guns in a hollow tree to keep 
the rust from ruining them, each buckled two revolvers 
around his waist and set out with us. 
. It was hard to tell now who of us was the most anx- 
ious for three o'clock and the meat and bread. Every 
few minutes one of them would go to the mountain sum- 
mit to look and listen. Soon after three o'clock the moth- 
er was with us again more frightened and distressed than 
before, for in the meantime the militia had searched the 
house and stable; and had taken every mouthful of meat 



152 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



and nearly all the bread she had prepared. What cora 
bread two of the neighbors had furnished and a little 
dried beef was all she brought, and among the rest was 
one corn pone which contained exactly a peek of meal, 
that Jane Howard had borrowed and baked for the oc- 
casion. 

Soon after four o'clock of that afternoon we turned our 
backs to that people with few regrets. Though the wo- 
men had been uniformly kind to us, yet there prevailed 
among them such a spirit of ruffianism, and such uncivil- 
ized manners, that our stay among them was everything 
but agreeable. 

Again under way for home, and this time behind two 
experienced guides, our hopes of success grew lively, too 
lively for the pleasure of our guides, for we would crowd 
upon their heels and get sent back every few minutes 
with some terrible oath. At dark we went down off the 
mountains and took the road, to enable us to make sev- 
enteen miles that night to a brother-in-law's of Jerry, 
where we expected to complete, our supply of provisions. 

Nine miles ahead was the French Broad, and in cross- 
ing the river we anticipated some trouble. Our only hope 
was in finding one of two canoes, reported to be hidden 
along its banks. The river at this point was deep and 
rough which made it very dangerous to swim, or to at- 
tempt to cross on a poorly constructed raft. Up and down 
the banks of the noisy stream we wandered for half an 
hour, hunting for the canoes without success, and our 
guides decided that before we would risk a swim or a 
temporary raft that we would go four miles up the river 
and cross on an old bridge there. "When we reached the 
place we found nothing of a bridge but two rows of piles 
stretching across the river, with 18 inch sleepers lying f 
on the tops of each row. The rest of the bridge, years j 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



153 



before had been swept away by high waters, and there 
had been no steps taken to rebuild it. To cross over these 
sleepers seemed practicable, so down on our hands and 
knees we got and crawled upon them. Though a little 
nervous all the while, we got along admirably till within 
thirty or forty feet of the opposite shore when, behold, to 
our great discomfiture some ruthless hand had rolled a 
sleeper from each row into the river. This was too bad, 
within thirty or forty feet of the other side and yet too 
far to get over. For several minutes we sat in a quanda- 

[ ry not knowing whether to retrace or sit there wishing. 
In the meantime we discovered that the sleeper which 
had been rolled off above still lay beneath against the piles 
with one end on some driftwood on the shore. Baker 
who happened to be in front, and there was no changing 
about on that narrow log, concluded that he would swing 
under and slide down the pile to the water and examine 
the feasibility of getting over on the floating log. Under 
he swings, down the pile he glides, plants his foot cau- 
tiously on the log, into the water it goes, Baker sticking 
bravely to it until he is buoyed, then he lets go the pile 
makes one step forward and another and another, and by 
the time he reaches the next pile he is raised almost en- 
tirely out of the water and walks triumphantly to the 
other side, i^ow that Baker was over, ail must be, and 
as he had crossed on the floating log all could cross, so at 
it we went in turns. All were soon on the other side 

! but the Irishman, he was not so successful. I have neg- 
lected to mention that he was the custodian of the peck 
pone of bread and that was all the provisions he carried, 
and that was more than his share even then, but because 
he was tough and willing we were disposed to place the 
honorable duty upon him. He carried his charge in a 
haversack prepared by the donor of the bread, and which 
in strength and capacity was equal to the burden, 



154' 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



Good was behind and when the rest of us all got to the 
other side, there he sat on top holding tenaciously to the 
sleeper, and the big pone holding to him, insisting that 
it was no use trying for he knew that he could not cross 
on that tottering log. Generally he was the bravest of 
the party, but some how or other he had an aversion for 
water that was marked the whole trip. We promised to 
help him with a pole, still he could not be persuaded, and 
becoming a little vexed we threatened to stone him off 
the sleeper if he did not try, for we could not be delayed 
there all night b}^ his cowardice. He would much rather 
have charged a battery than attempted that crossing, but 
when we alluded to his cowardice he was decided upon 
drowning or reaching the bank. Quick as a sailor could 
have done it, he was under the sleeper clinging like a fly- 
ing-squirrel with his short legs and arms to the pile, down 
he slips a little piece and, Holy St. Patrick ! there lay^the 
monstrous pone still on top, and the string of his haver- 
sack fast on a splinter. He asserted that he would strip 
it off his houlder and let it go — we declared we would 
drown him if he did. He was in great distress but con- 
cealed it like a stoic. Again he pulls himself up the pile 
an ineh at a time till he reaches the sleeper; now he holds 
on with his legs and one hand and employs the other in 
assisting down the pone. Cautiously he proceeds, but in 
an unguarded moment the unrighteous pone comes tum- 
bling off and jerks the unhappy boy down the pile into 
the water to his neck. If we had not felt concerned 
about his life sure enough now we would have been un- 
able to render any assistance for laughter, but as it was 
Chisman ran out on the floating log with a long pole and 
soon had our unfortunate comrade wringing his clothes 
on the bank, and another item to laugh about at our lei- 
sure, 

We had yet eight miles to go to reach the brother-in- 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



155 



aws', and as it was our desire to make that distance before 
laylight we tarried no longer than was necessary to 
»vring our clothes and pour the water out of our boots. 
Our guides being fresh and skilled in night walking moved 
along briskly, and continued through the entire eight 
miles without stopping a moment to rest. 

"The honest watch dog" bayed at us at Banks Burton's 
before the chickens called out the morning. The family 
were all asleep, but through Jerry we soon got a welcome 
admission into the house. Chisman did honest Mr. Bur- 
ton the honor to ask if the promise to Abraham had been 
repeated to him, that if he would depart into a strange 
land he should become the father of a great nation. And 
truly the facts seemed to warrant such an inquiry. The 
cabin of but one room, the fruitful home of the latter days 
patriarch, we found sitting down between two mountains 
in the midst of a farm of just seven acres, boasting the very 
"magnicentfi distance" of six mountain miles to the nearest 
neighbors. Upon entering the house it had more the ap- 
pearance of an infantry hospital than anything else. 
There were two beds on steads, "and pallets to the right 
of us, pallets to the left of us, pallets all around," with 
children in regular ratio from one to twenty-one resting 
upon them. It was with difficulty that we crowded our 
way through and arranged ourselves on an old bench be- 
fore the fireplace, occupying nearly all one end of the 
house. If it was only the hospitable nature of our host 
that prompted him to such an exertion for our comfort 
and pleasure, we have few such in Indiana. Having first 
built us a good fire, he then went to the bed on steads and 
turning out three large girls, insisted that we four stran- 
gers occupy the same for sleep the balance of the morning. 
This we did not wish to do. Men of our habits, with wet 
and dirty clothes would vastly prefer sleeping on the floor 
before the fire, and we told the old gentleman so, but the 
more we would excuse ourselves the more he would insist 



156 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



that he had plenty of girls that could wash easier than 
we could lay on puncheons. 

Next morning the family were up early, big and little- 
crowding and whispering that four Yankees were " asleep 
in that bed." "Does they look like pap?" said one little 
urchin to his mother. 

"Do Yankees kill little boys?" concerned another 
young hopeful, and a fourth wanted to know, " will they 
kill Abraham Lambe?" a rebel he knew of. 

It will be remembered it was the arrangement to 
increase our supply of provisions at this place fully one- 
half, and strange to say, we found this enormous family 
without a mouthful of meat or an ounce of breadstuff in 
the house, r>nd they talked of the circumstance as nothing 
uncommon. The nearest mill was twelve miles, and the 
nearest neighbor six, but soon after sun-up two boys got 
in with a half bushel of borrowed meal. In the mean- 
time our two guides and the host had gone to the moun- 
tain ranges for meat, and soon after the bo} T s returned. 
They came down the mountain, dragging after them two 
considerable hogs they had killed. These hogs they 
dressed like beeves at the foot of the mountain, and car- 
ried the meat to the house on poles. 

At eight o'clock breakfast was in process of prepara- 
tion ; at nine it was ready and we called to eat. The 
breakfast consisted only of coffee made from parched 
meal, corn bread and fresh pork. If I have to tell it all, 
too, I will have to say that their entire table service con- 
sisted of six plates, including two tin pans, three knives, 
two forks, and one large, antediluvian dish. Not one 
single cup or saucer made its appearance, but gourds 
answered in their stead. This seemed like true poverty 
indeed, yet we heard less complaint about hard times than 
by many well to do families in this State of plenty and 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 157 

i 

ifluence, — yes, saw more generous hospitality, a greater 
-willingness to divide a scanty subsistence with a needy feh 
bw creature, than we could hope to find in a majority of 
amilies around us in Indiana. For, notwithstanding 
\Ir. Burton's poverty, notwithwithstanding his humble 
valk iu life and modest pretensions, there was in his 
leart that spirit of brotherly love and godly charity, that 
should entitle him to a higher social standard in the esti- 
mation of a Christian people, than the thousands of sor- 
did tfich who hoard up for decay, and turn the needy 
away empty. It is among such untutored poor that we 
find truly the normal condition of man, and it is from 
such that vre can best learn the strange but unequivocal 
fact, that education, refinement and wealth, with their 
attendant blessings, have withal a tendency to alienate 
J;he heart from its natural and christian duties. Riches 
"and rebellion, poverty and loyalty, were correlative terms 
in the South during the w r ar. 

This family prepared us a large quantity of meat and. 
what bread they could spare, and had us ready to resume 
our journey by eleven o'clock. But for some reason our 
guides were disposed to be tardy, and it was late in the 
afternoon before we left Mr. Burton's. Then when we 
did leave it w T as in a slow and careless manner, resting 
every half mile longer than it took us to walk that dis- 
tance; but what troubled us most were the frequent pri- 
vate interviews and whisperings of our guides. Matters 
went on till night in a very unsatisfactory manner, the 
time being spent without a half dozen words being inter- 
changed between us and those upon whom we so much 
depended. ISText morning it was long after sun-up before 
we got started. Jack now feigned sickness, and Jerry 
continued to talk discouragingly of the prospects; he 
had heard of so many perishing in the snow; our way 
lay over the roughest of the range one hundred and 



158 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



eighty miles, and the clouds betokened snow already ; we 
had not half enough food for the trip, etc., etc. 

All day long very much disheartened we trudged along, | 
up and down, up and down, the mountain peaks and 
succeeded just before the sun set in reaching the summit 
of Mount Pisgah, reputed among the natives of Western 
North Carolina as being the second highest mountain in 
all the Appalachian range, and from whose summit the 
eye can see into five States, namely, North Carolina, 
South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee and Virginia. From 
this mountain, directly in our course, apparently within a 
mile and a half, but which in reality was seven miles 
away, we saw a number of mysterious fires. The guides 
became more uneasy than ever at the appearance of these 
fires. They withdrew and consulted twenty minutes; 
then climbed a tree and averred that they could see men 
moving about the fires seven miles off, and that they 
knew no other route tban over that particular mountain. 
They also pathetically spoke of the outlaw's penalty, and 
the terrible result if they were to be captured, and were 
of the opinion that no rational man would try to pass 
that mountain with the indications of danger that they 
could so clearly see ; and further, as for them they would, 
from no inducements, attempt it now, but if we would 
return home with them and stay through the winter, the 
next spring they would be sure to take us through for 
half the compensation. No anticipated danger could dis- 
suade us from our purpose of going ahead, for dangers 
were all around us, behind us and on all sides, apparently 
equal to those in front. So we were all of one mind, not i 
to take an inch backward while there was no actual 
restraint from taking one nearer home. We combined 
our efforts to encourage our guides, dwelt upon their in- 
evitable suffering if they returned home to spend the 
winter, assured them that we would pay them promptly 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 159 

I 

and see that they got comfortable quarters for the winter 
in Knoxville if they did not wish to go home with us. 
It was an anxious moment with us. If they abandoned 
us on that mountain, what would become of us? Hot 
| one of us knew anything about the mountain courses 
more than their general direction — not one of us could 
. distinguish the ridges from the spurs — not one of us 
j could tell north from south in that wild region after the 
sun went down; but with all this before us we could not 
think of going back forty or fifty miles to live three or 
I four months with that gang of robbers. We not only 
j offered to increase their compensation to any sum they 
might fix, but we begged, beseeched them not to turn 
back; but hearts full of fear, or minds full of mistrust? 
hears nothing and grants nothing, and as distressing as it 
was to us we parted— they to go home, we, we knew not 
whither, 



160 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



CHAPTER VII. 

SOUTH HOMINY CREEK, BUNCOMBE COUNTY, NORTH CAROLINA 

UNCLE JIMMY SMITH THAT DAY'S FIGHT BETWEEN THE 

UNIONISTS AND REBELS GEORGE PEOPLES KIM DAVIS — 

OUR NEXT GUIDE A WEEK IN BUNCOMBE COUNTY THE 

GIRLS OP BUNCOMBE FAREWELLS IN THE DAVIS FAMILY— 

AGAIN IN THE MOUNTAINS SANDY MUSH ROCKY RIDGE 

MR. DUNN'S THE MULES— FEDERAL PICKETS KNOXVILLE— 

THE OLD FLAG HOW WE FELT HOW WE LOOKED GAY 

STREET GENERAL CARTER IN A FEDERAL HOSPITAL HOOD 

BESIEGING NASHVILLE ORGANIZATION FOR HOME VIA CUM- 
BERLAND GAP— KIM HOME AGAIN CONCLUSION. 

Off to the right, six or seven miles, we could see a nar- 
row strip of cultivated land following the meanderings 
of some stream, and here and there a column of smoke 
rising from a house. 

Feeling the necessity for a guide to be absolute, and 
hoping to find one in the settlement to the right, as the 
only alternative we started down the side of the Pisgah 
in a hurry, for the shades of night already began to 
gather in the valley. The settlement we found bore the 
name of South Hominy Creek, Buncombe county, North 
Carolina. It was nearly dark when we got down the 
mountain. In the very point of the valley, where it was 
not more than a hundred yards wide, and where South 
Hominy Creek is nothing more than a gurgling rivulet, 
sat an unpretentious cabin, quiet as a tomb, and but for 
form of a man engaged near the door we should have 
pronounced it unoccupied. Crawling up within fifty 
yards of the cabin to make observations, we were soon 
all satisfied that the stooped and stiffened form before us 
was that of an old man ; and Baker having on a full suit 
of rebel uniform, was soon over to see him> 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



161 



We hoped to obtain the gentlemen's political princi- 
ples in disguise. Baker being in rebel uniform, he could 
approach him directly upon that point; if a rebel, Baker 
could excuse himself and retire; if a Union man, he 
could call the rest of us to aid in convincing him that we 
were also. Baker summarily accosted Uncle Jimmy 
Smith, a diminutive, but as honored an old gentleman 
in his country as one of the same name is in ours, with: 

"Grandpa, are you a rebel or a Union man?" 

"What, sir?" replied Uncle Jimmy, straightening him- 
self up. 

"I want to know, just for fun, whether you are a rebel 
or a Union man ? " 

" What do you want to know that for?" 

" Oh, I have heard you called both, and as I was pass- 
j ing, I just thought I would ask you." 

"Well, sir, if it will do you any good to know, I will 
tell you that I was bora under the old government, have 
lived eighty-two years under it, and I am an old man 
now,' and want no better to die under. If this is not 
enough, I will add further, if you are a rebel soldier you 
will relieve me by passing on." 

When we went rather hastily up upon Baker's whistle 
and motion, old Jimmy was much agitated, for he thought 
he had brought down some punishment upon himself by 
his acknowledgment. And now we had a tough time of 
it. We believed that he was a Union man, and knew 
ourselves to be, but the trouble was in persuading him to 
the same opinion. But the facts he detailed made it not 
seem strange to us that he should seem scrupulous. 
There had been that very day two companies of rebels, 
and one of them Indians, in the settlement, "after the 
boys," as he called them ; by whom he meant the Union 
boys who had been pressed into the rebel army, and who 
had deserted and come home. 
11 



162 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



The facts in the case were these: They had been 
betrayed by just such strangers as we were. Ten days 
before two strange men, representing themselves as bro- 
thers named Muse, came to "the boys" on South Hom- 
iny Creek and implored protection — said they lived over 
in Transylvania county, and having deserted the rebel 
army to keep from fighting against the Union, it was 
impossible for them to remain about home and escape 
arrest ; that knowing the facilities for hiding among the 
rugged peaks in Buncombe, they had come to beg a 
home with them for a few months, hoping to be able to 
compensate the triends for their board after the war was 
over. The credulous and hospitable boys committing the 
blunder of many such men — that of believing because 
they are honest, everybody else is so — received the Muses 
into their confidence without a suspicion. 

It was Sunday evening that we went into the settle- 
ment, and on the evening before the Muse boys were 
unaccounted for, though no serious apprehensions were 
felt on account of the probability of their being among 
some of the friends in the neighborhood. Thoughtless 
of the dangers that were gathering, they drew their 
blankets about them in their mountain beds, to be awak- 
ened at dawn next morning by the militia, Indians and 
all, sweeping like an avalanche down the mountain upon 
them, led by the perfidious spies. 

Up and at it, for liberty and life, from rock to tree and 
tree to rock they fought through all that Sunday, wound- 
ing and being wounded, two or three of them in their 
turn. Two were led away captives, but for the pleasure 
of locking the hand-cuffs upon two loyal men, the mili- 
tia had the displeasure of binding up the wounds of as 
many more rehels. 

Consequently, from this unexpected raid, the whole 
settlement was intensely excited; then is it surprising 



•SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



163 



that old Jimmy Smith should sincerely believe that we 
were but a part of that rebel gang, and that we were 
feigning to be Yankees for some such purpose as the 
Muses had so successful wrought. So he did believe, at 
all events ; and the earnestness with which he expressed 
his determination not to be betrayed, as the boys had 
been, was quite embarrassing to us. It vexes one always 
to be disbelieved when he tells the truth. It vexed us 
doubly here, for we told the whole truth about a matter 
in which it was so important that we should be believed. 
Old Jimmy urged us to go along and let him alone ; he 
was too old to be mistreated, as well as too sharp to be 
■caught on chaff. A happy thought came into Baker's 
head when he remembered that he had his commission 
in the 6th Missouri Federal Infantry in his pocket. 

" Can you read writing, grandpa ? " 

"Yes." 

"Well, here is my commission as First Lieutenant in 
the Yankee Army; examine it, if you please." 

The reading of that paper alone, by the dim fire light 
in the house, convinced the old gentleman that we were 
really Federal soldiers. Then he lost not a moment in 
hurrying us off to hide, lest the rebels should be still in 
the neighborhood and drop in Upon us any moment. 

Old Jimmy was poor, very poor ; living with his daugh- 
ter while her husband was away in the rebel army ; yet 
he was rich enough to have a good warm supper spread 
out before us in the bushes before eight o'clock. 

Henry K. Davis was one of "the boys," rather the 
leader or commander among them; anyhow, so far as 
directing movements against the common enemy were 
concerned. He was represented to be a young man of 
high sense of honor, as well in his engagements as in his 
social relations, and to our encouragement had been twice 
through the mountains to Knoxville, and was at the time 



164 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



very desirous of leaving the South altogether for the 
North, if he could get some company. 

To see Kim (for that was the name he bore among his 
neighbors) was now our heart's desire. I believe we had 
the impudence to ask Uncle Jimmy to conduct us three 
miles yet that night to the neighborhood of George Peo- 
ples, where it was expected we might find him. But the 
old man could not accommodate us ; his eyes failed him 
after night, in his old age; then he had run about so 
much through the neighborhood during that day of ex- 
citement, that he was nearly exhausted. However, he 
promised to be off" with us next morning by daylight, if 
we would stay where we were. 

We made no attempt at sleep that night— did not even 
spread our blankets. The desertion of our guides, the 
effect of that day's raid in the settlement upon our pros- 
pects, the adventure expected to-morrow with Kim Davis 
and his men, were all subjects to be discussed. 

With the much delayed dawn came Uncle Jimmy, tot- 
tering up the mountain with a basket on his arm, and a 
gun on his shoulder. 

" What's the old man want with that gun ?" anxiously 
inquired Good. 

" I can't imagine," said Baker. 

" I think I know," said Chisman, "he looks to me just 
like a Knownothing executioner, hunting for Irishmen ; 
take heart, my boy, I'll plant a sprig of Cashew at your 
head, and write to your mother." 

Uncle Jimmy explained it in another way. "You 
see," said he, "the rebels were all over the settlement yes- 
terday, some of them may be lurking about here yet — my 
old gun can do us no harm, and if we should happen to 
get captured, I thought, by having my gun, I might 
shield myself and make your case no worse, by telling the 
rebels I had captured you, and was taking you to them— 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



165 



then, as I return through the mountains, I might get a 
chance at a turkey, or a deer, or some other game." 

George Peoples was a Mason, and Chisman thought he 
might use the "mystic chord" to our advantage; also, 
Mr. Peoples was a man of good information and emi- 
nently loyal. For these reasons it was thought prudent 
that we be conducted to his heighborhood, and placed 
under his direction, till a conference could be had with 
Davis. 

We ate a hasty breakfast from the basket, and set out. 
Uncle Jimmy's activity surprised us ; truly, too, it came 
near surpassing all of us. Though he tottered like an 
old tree, loose at the roots, he had a wonderful facility for 
getting over space. I do not think he walked a step the 
whole distance ; it was run all the way. With his body 
bent forward at an angle of forty-five degrees, he went as 
rapidly through the mountains as a trained youth, stop- 
ping now and then to look or listen, with up -turned ear. 

George Peoples was not at home ; he had gone with 
two daughters on a week's journey into Transylvania 
county, to drive home some hogs. But his inestimable 
lady was there, who, directing uncle Jimmy to conduct 
us to a certain gorge, said that she would see that we 
lacked for nothing until Kim Davis could be found. The 
old gentleman led us up into the rocky gorge, and into 
a cluster of laurel bushes, and exhorting us to keep on 
the alert during the day, set out to hunt Davis, with the 
promise to report success that night, if possible. 

About noon, two little girls came up with our dinner. 
In the evening the same two came again to tell us that 
their mother would expect us to take supper at the house, 
a little after dark ; that their brother Wash., one of Davis' 
gang, would be there to see us. 

At dark we went down, doubting nothing. Wash, met 
us on the barnyard fence, and astonished us by saying 



166 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



that he had been hiding all day in the same mountain^, 
but a few hundred yards above us ; that he had seen us 
several times moving about in the bushes, and two or 
three times had picked up his musket to shoot one, think- 
ing that we were some skulking militia. 

Mrs. P. soon announced her supper, and after the ordi- 
nary salutations, requested us to make baste to eat it and 
get back to the mountains, for she was always in mortal 
terror when any of the boys were about the house. The 
little girls were posted on each side of the house to watch ; 
then we went to our seats at the table. Mrs. P. had many 
questions to ask; so had Wash., and the conversation was 
running glibly and merrily along, when suddenly two- 
little girls came dashing into the house, stammering in a 
frenzied manner : " The militia are coming through the 
garden !" 

Up to that moment we claimed to be equal to anybody 
in agility, but ever after that event we had a modified 
opinion of ourselves in that respect. 

Wash., was sitting on a bench, next to the wall, hemmed 
in at both ends, when the alarm was given. On top of 
the bench, over the table, and out of the house he sprang, 
the back way, quicker than we could drop our pumpkin 
pie to follow him. We rushed in panic out the same way y 
only to get a glimpse of him as he flew across the barn- 
yard toward the mountain. Wishing not to lose him, if 
we were to be pursued by the rebels, and hoping to gain 
something on a straight run, we threw down whatever 
encumbered us, and put into action our very best effort,, 
but only to see ourselves more outdone than at the first. 
Before we got half across the barn yard, he was over the 
fence on the other side, flying up the mountain like the 
shadow to a hurrying cloud. 

The occasion for running, however, was misconceived, 
and our clumsy locomotion was not particularly to our 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



167 



disadvantage. We four had but entered the woods, when 
Mrs. P., from the house, gently called Wash. ; there being 
no answer, she called again, much louder than before — 
this time Wash, answered away up the mountain, three 
or four hundred yards ahead of us. 

" Come back, Wash. ; it's all right." 

Wash, soon joined us again at the foot of the moun- 
tain, and the first thing he did was to excuse himself for 
his rather informal manner of leaving us; said he had 
been chased so much by the rascals, and had made such 
narrow escapes, that when they got after him now he had 
but little command of his judgment. 

We all went back to the house to learn the cause of our 
alarm. As we approached the fence dividing the house 
from the barn yard, we discovered three men sitting 
there, with their guns lying on their laps in a careless 
way; we stopped — "Come one," says some one of the 
three; and Wash., being satisfied, led the way up to 
them. 

It was Kim. Davis on the right, Wash. Curtis in the 
middle, and Mitch. Warren on the left, sent to us by the 
ever faithful uncle Jimmy. There was no introductions — 
not even a general mention of names. Kim. was satis- 
fied that we were the men he had come to see, and we 
had a suspicion that he was the man we wanted to see. 

Jumping off the fence, Kim. said, "Let's go up into 
the mountain and have a talk — this place is too much 
exposed." 

He led the way to the identical gorge we had spent the 
day in, and seating ourselves together, he and his com- 
rades proceeded to catechise us, perhaps as severely as 
the Vances, but in a manner vastly more civil. Civil, 
because they were not abusive, and because their proced- 
ure was eminently cunning and sagacious. It is hard to 
'believe that men could have told a falsehood and escaped 



168 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



discovery. They would take us on all sides and by cross- 
fire, at the same time, asking each of us a different ques- 
tion at the same time, pertaining to the same subject, and 
in no instance put a question in such a way that it would 
itself suggest the answer. 

The examination having elicited nothing against us, 
Kim. became free to talk upon the subject desired. His 
remarks were, m substance, as follows: 

"Yes, sir, I have made up my mind that I should like 
to go North, if I had any assurance of getting through 
the Northern army into the country, where I could throw 
away my gun. I am tired of this war — this man killing 
out of the army, as well as in the army — I've endured all 
that I'm willing to endure ; have done enough to excuse 
me from more — like a slave to the field I was driven to 
the rebel army — marched six months in that treasonable 
array— since then I have lived two years in the moun- 
tains, watching for and hiding from an assassin all the 
time, and I'm now tired of the business. I have but little 
at stake in the contest anyhow — have no negroes to save, 
nor much property to protect, and I am so tired of hunt- 
ing men's lives and hiding to save my own — I don't want 
to go into either army at this date. Your offer is liberal, 
but I want it understood that my services are not mer- 
chandise, to be bought and sold; and if I go with you it 
will be as a companion, and not as a servant. This is the 
only condition I will act upon : that you guarantee to me 
that when I have conducted you to Knoxville, you will 
conduct me north of the Ohio River, and protect me from 
the army." 

The bargain was soon struck, but it grieved us to hear 
Mr. Davis say that he could not be ready to start before 
the following Sunday. However, we were not disposed 
to complain, for this time we felt confident that we were 
having to do with an honest and honorable man, who 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



169 



would act by us as he agreed, and in the meantime not fail 
to recognise us to be men worthy of some respect at 
least. 

It was soon arranged among the companions that we 
should be conducted back to the neighborhood of uncle 
Jimmy and Evaline his daughter, to remain during the 
week of preparation, as it was regarded the most private 
and best place to hide of any in the settlement. 

That night, however, we slept in the wood near Kim's 
father, and next morning before daylight went to the 
house for our breakfast. Asbury and Margaret A. Davis, 
Kim's parents, were getting old, and both very much con- 
cerned about the safety of their son — would have been 
much pleased with our arrangement with Kim. if they 
could have dismissed from their minds a suspicion that we 
might be spies, seeking to lead their boy to capture. But, 
amid the many dangers that surrounded him at home, 
with all their doubts and fears, I never heard that either 
of them opposed his embarking upon the trip. Next 
morning we went back to uncle Jimmy's, and were placed 
in his care for the week, the necessary provision being 
furnished by Kim. and his friends. Kim. then took his 
leave but first exhorting us to be of good cheer, for he 
would be ready promptly. 

As it was in Henderson county, so it was in Buncomb 
with regard to the number of ladies that visited us while 
at uncle Jimmy's ; nor did they come with empty hands 
or empty pockets. There is Rachel and Polly, and Ma- 
tilda and Minerva, and Lucy and Sarahs whose fair forms 
even yet flit before me with hands full of chestnuts, 
choice apples, or other luxuries for us. Scarcely an hour 
passed in the day that some good thing was not laid at 
our feet from the hands of some loyal girl ; and when 
they washed and mended up our miserable old rags till 
they were comfortable, we would have called them the 



170 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



kindest women in the world, if it had not been for the 
sisters in Henderson county. As it was, they were as 
kind as it was possible to be. 

Notwithstanding we were among friends, and had 
plenty to eat, it seemed a long time till next Sunday 
morning. It was home that had our hearts many hun- 
dred miles away, over the wild, rugged, trackless moun- 
tains. IsTo flowers, no birds, no fair women, no boon 
companions, no ambition could dissolve our fostered 
yearnings to be with friends at home, where we could lie 
down in peace, and speak of these times as by-gones. 

Kim. was back from Haywood county, where he had 
gone to fix up some business long before his time, and 
was punctually at uncle Jimmy's Saturday evening to lead 
us to his father's. Sunday morning, the fourth day of 
December, 1864, we shook the frost from our blankets 
before three o'clock, and went to the house to arrange 
the preliminaries for starting. There was much trouble 
on this occasion in the Davis family. Asbury and Mar- 
garet, were both fond parents. They had spent many 
sleepless nights, and shed many tears when they knew 
their son was shivering in the mountain or being chased 
by some blood thirsty rebels; and because the authorities 
at Ashville had offered one thousand dollars reward for 
his arrest, it made the fond parents dote on him all the 
more. They had watched him and hid him for two years 
with dreadful solicitude, and now he was about to go from 
under their roof, perhaps forever, to a strange land, with 
strangers whom they nor he had ever seen or heard of 
a week before. Then thought they, these strangers may 
be spies decoying Kim. out to murder him, or they may 
all be captured on the way, or may be they will draft 
him into the Union army, and he get killed in battle, or 
may be they will cast him off, without money or friends, 
as soon as they get to the JSTorth. Such forebodings of 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



171 



evil crowded into the minds of these fond parents to cul- 
minate their trouble, particularly into that of the mother, 
who went about the house with streaming eyes to fix us 
off with every thing necessary for the trip. 

This good woman and patriotic citizen has since been 
" gathered to her fathers" to be white-robed for her many 
virtues, and for the cross she -bore during the war ; but 
her spirit is still "hovering around" the persecuted loyal 
boys of South Hominy creek, who ate so often from her 
bounty and had so much of her sympathy, encouraging 
them to remain steadfast in their attachment to that 
government which was instituted and which is sought to 
be maintained in the interests of all men equally. 

At seven o'clock in the morning the last words were 
spoken, and we were going across the field loaded like 
five pack mules, with sweet cakes and boiled ham. 

Mitch. "Warren and Wash. Curtis, loath to part with 
their companion, went with us a couple of miles into the 
mountains. The course we aimed to take because of its 
greater safety, would make the distance to Knoxville one 
hundred and sixty miles, over the roughest and wildest 
mountains in the range, hence we could hope to travel 
only by daylight. Kim. had been raised among the 
mountains : had chased deer and bears over them so much 
that he was not only active, but never made a mistake in 
direction. Our traveling now was very different from 
what it was with our former guides ; we went right along 
now without a discord or a jealousy — driving ahead all 
the time in daylight, and sleeping together as boon com- 
panions after dark. 

It would be hardly possible for men to work harder 
than we did during the seven days occupied by that trip* 
Our strength was employed to its utmost capacity every 
day. It was up and down, up and down the mountains 
all the time ; stretching ourselves out to Yermonters as 



172 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



we pulled up one side, and stavin g ourselves up to Chi- 
nesemen going down the other side. And oh, dear, there 
is Sandy Mush ; it makes my heart ache yet to think of 
that horrible mountain. Running backwards across a 
public highway to show our tracks in the other direction, 
then about face and up the almost perpendicular side of 
Sandy for a mile, all the time as much exposed to the 
gaze of any passer by as if we had been climbing a flag 
pole on a public square. Every muscle was called into 
action, and for the first hundred jumps I was in the van. 
But poor me, I failed, not for want of resolution, but 
strength. It was so steep that it really made my head 
swim to look back. I never would have got up, if it had 
not been for the huckleberry bushes, and the fear of rebel 
eyes. As it was, before the rest of us was half way, Kim. 
was lying on top shooting pebbles over our heads into the 
road a mile below ; he ran up like a squirrel. 

There, too, is Rocky Ridge, to which I do not "look 
backward with a smile." It was the only dangerous 
mountain we passed, and we had to pass it to keep our 
course. The peak of the Rocky Ridge, though rising 
but a little higher than its neighbors, stood like a mighty 
wall one hundred and fifty feet from top to base, with 
sides nearly perpendicular, and top or terrace for eight 
hundred yards, from four to ten feet wide ; a single step 
to the right or left in a few places would have dashed us 
to pieces on the rocks below. We passed the place, too 
by moonlight, the first man getting on top from the 
shoulder of his comrade, then pulling the rest up, and 
sliding down at the other end on a pole. 

On the night of the ninth ot December we slept in a 
house, the first for seven months, within seven miles of 
Knoxville. It was in the house of a Mr. Dunn, an officer 
in our army, and whose house was a kind of general ren- 
dezvous for the Union men of that country. There were 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



173 



a half dozen such there that night, mostly traders to and 
from Knoxville. Next morning upon turning our faces 
towards the mountains that we had left but thirty-six 
hours before, we could but feel grateful to Him who 
regardeth even the sparrows, for they had cast about them 
a heavy mantle of snow, and their avenues closed for the 
winter. A fortunate escape. 

One gentleman who staid all night at Mr. Dunn's was 
on his way to Knoxville to market with a couple of mules. 
Chisman, always on the alert for number one, saw the 
gentleman during the night with reference to a ride to the 
city, and in his arrangements did not forget his compan- 
ion of ninety-nine troubles. Immediately after breakfast 
we strode one a piece of the divinely honored family, 
without saddle or bridle, but excellent rope halters, and 
trotted briskly off. We looked once back to our com- 
rades trudging through the mud on foot, and wished they 
too had mules, but wished more to be ourselves in Knox- 
ville. The master of the mules, a good humored sort of 
a man, let us have things pretty much our own way, and 
we spared neither rein nor switch till the towers of 
staunch old Knoxville loomed up in the distance : now we 
gave up our mules and sat down by the roadside to wait 
for our party. They soon came up, a little mad because 
we had ridden over live muddy miles without exchanging 
with them. Good, wiping the perspiration from his clas- 
sic brow, remarked, " well, it's a bastely mane trick any- 
how, that ye will ride five miles without letting us ride 
an inch." " Look out, goosey," replied Chisman, " remem- 
ber that we have the Holstein to cross yet, and you know 
your weakness." 

On the next range of hills nearer the city, we came upon 
a party of men sitting around a fire. They, failing to 
challenge us, Good shouted, " who sits there ?" " Eighth 
Michigan Cavalry" was the reply. "Then give me a 



174 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



chew of Yankee tobacco, if you please." These were 
the Federal pickets. We only tarried long enough to 
answer a few general questions about our escape, and ask 
a few concerning the military situation. We were sadly 
disappointed to hear that Hood was besieging: Nashville, 
and had destroyed all railroad communication with the 
North. But our cup of happiness still seemed full enough, 
to find once more Yankee bayonets at our backs, and 
Yankee friends in our front. We talked as glibly as we 
walked on, splashing through the mud. In the midst of 
our glee and air castles, we reached the top of a hill a 
halt mile from town, and there, spread out before us in a 
grand panorama, was the city of Knoxville with her for- 
tifications. To the left was the loved old flag, floating 
gloriously from the parapet of Fort Johnson. There was 
the Holstein, with her steamers smoking at the wharves. 
There was the long bridge stretching across her turbid 
waters. There was the park of army wagons. There 
was the tented field. There were Federal soldiers drilling 
on the lawn. There was the hum of industry wafted on 
the breeze— -we stood a moment in silence; we looked 
congratulations at each other. We did not fall down and 
give up the ghost. We did not go into ecstacies. We 
did not hus: each other as some have done. We did not 

-I 

cry. We simply felt good and went on. 

As we approached the river a well dressed man came 
dashing up to us upon a horse with the air of a lord. 
He was a steamboat captain and accosted us with — 

"Boys, do you want work?" 

"Well, sir," retorted Chisman, "I don't know; what 
kind can you give us ? " 

" I want to hire four or five good strong hands for a 
few days to heave coal on my boat." 

"Really," returned Chisman, "we would like exceed* 
ingly to accommodate you, but being United States army 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



175 



officers, the government will probably have work for us 
to do soon." 

"We crossed the river bridge and stood at the foot of 
Gay street parleying. We felt that our wardrobes were 
not in a suitable condition to appear in the streets of a 
fashionable city ; yet it was necessary to reach the head- 
quarters of the Provost Marshal General. 

Chisman stood upon the uppers of a pair of Southern 
army brogans, bound to his feet with bark, and in the 
frame of a pair of Yankee pants, which but for the 
patches of red flannel and Earth Carolina linsey, would 

i hardly have deserved the name, and which modestly or 
immodestly retired half way to the knees, leaving a touch 
of the Black Crook for exhibition. His sack coat was 
rather good and his cap tolerable, but such hair and 
beard were never seen on an honest man with opportuni- 
ties. Our eccentric Irishman was the poorest one of all. 
Poor fellow, he left his last leather in the mountains, and 
on our way through Sevier county, Tennessee, begged 
the legs of a pair of brown jeans pants which he swad- 
dled around his feet. The mud that he thereby carried, 
and the tracks that he made, were no fault of his but of 
the rags. He had been a prisoner twenty-two months, 
and had changed pants but once in the time. Those he 
had on had formerly been rebel, but like Chisman's was 

i now m a state of dilapidation, and that for which I never 
did forgive him, one day as we lay in the woods, the ras- 
cal took my Columbia towel, and without my advice or 
consent made an important addition to one of the legs. 
His jacket was also rebel, but notwithstanding it was too 
short and a little out of fix at the elbows, when buttoned 
up, if he could have had on a shirt, his naked, body would 
not have been seen. His hat I have lost sight of, but it 
was in keeping with the rest. As for Baker, he was the 
best dressed one of the party, having had a coat given 



176 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



him in North Carolina, and been an adroit financier in 
prison. The writer was next best. He had the worst 
hat of any, having no crown at all, but excepting- his 
head and his feet he was comfortable but not gaudily 
attired. Kim. so recently from the supervision of his 
mother, was well enough to do. 

Sunday seemed to be our transition day all along the 
journey — no important change in our affairs occurred on 
any other day. It was Sunday that we found the Union 
girls on the mountain in Henderson county; it was Sun- 
day that the Vances deserted us on Pisgah, and when we 
found Uncle Jimmy Smith ; it was Sunday that Kim Da- 
vis started with us from Buncombe county; and it was 
on Sunday that we stood in Gay street, in Knoxville, 
ready to report to Gen. Carter. It was just church going 
time, too, and the bells ringing out from every steeple in 
the city when we got our courage to the sticking point 
of making our way through the street to the headquar- 
ters of the General, unseemly as we were. 

Good scraped the mud off his rags with a splinter the 
best he could; Chisman pulled down his pants; I pinned 
in the crown of my hat ; and with Baker, the most gen- 
teel of any, in the lead, we took our accustomed Indian 
file up the sidewalk. Not one of us expected to blush or 
feel "harrowed up" by the citizens ; for what should we 
care? We had come to our present state honorably, 
then probably there was not a single soul in the city to 
know us. But our debut was not eminently agreeable on 
account of the soldiers. They, as a rule, never were 
scrupulously severe in their practice of politeness. On 
this occasion they lampooned us at every street crossing. 
One chap, whose stature was fashioned very much like I 
have seen many Indianians, with six inches of Bologna 
in one hand and a loaf of bread in the other, squalled 
out to a party of marble players on the corner : 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 177 

" Great Heavens, boys, look at these refugees coming 
in to draw our rations." 

"Halloo, stranger, what will you take for your shoes? 
Say, Johnny, if you don't put weights to your pants, 
they will crawl over your head." 

There were no replies, for we all knew too well the end 
of a soldier's tongue, to begin a retort with such a com- 
pany. 

Soon we stood at the door of General Carter's head- 
quarters. 

" Sentinel, be so kind as to say to the General that 
there are four officers who wish to see him at the door." 
""Where are they?" mischievously inquired the boy. 
" We are they, sir." 

" Ha, ha, ha ! you can't fool an old soldier. Orderly," 
says he to another youngster, writing a letter on a box, 
"go and tell the General that there are some refugees 
wanting to see him down here." • 

"iso, sir," exclaimed Chisman, boiling over completely 
with wrath, " tell him that four United States officers 
just escaped from prison at Columbia, are wanting to see 
him at the door. Any more impertinence out of you, sir," 
turning to the sentinel, "and I'll put you in the guard- 
house, you young reprobate." 

Gen. Carter received us very kindly, indeed. After 
hearing and noting down our full report of the condition 
of the South, he gave us an order upon the Quartermas- 
ter for whatever articles of clothing we might want that 
he had; then an order to be received into the Officers' 
Hospital, to depart at our pleasure. 

Sure enough, Hood had destroyed the railroad below 
Nashville, and was at this time with his army, in their 
works around the city. Thus the only communication 
iTorth was over-land, via Cumberland Gap, and the only 

way to reach home that winter, it then seemed, was to 
12 



178 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



make another march of 190 miles through the Gap, to 
the railroad at Nicholasville Kentucky. But it consoled 
us some to learn that the wires were still working through 
the Gap, and that we could hear from home if we could 
not get there. 

At the Quartermasters' we took a soldier's suit complete, 
from trooper's boots to high-topped hat, and with the 
things under our arms, we reported to the Surgeon in 
charge of Officers' Hospital. First we were shown to the 
bath room, where we were soon joined by four stout ne- 
groes, with soap, towels and flesh brushes, and after an 
hour of alternate perspiration and refrigeration, we came 
out of there in our new clean clothes, feeling very much 
improved by the exercise. Our next point was the bar- 
ber shop, where the tonsorial art was applied to our faces 
and heads, and then to the telegraph office; and I lived 
longer and lived happier than I ever did before or since 
in the same length ofrtime as the following went over the 
wires : 

Knoxville, Dec. 10th, 1864. 

"E. H. — ESCAPED — WELL — WILL TRY TO BE HOME FOR 
CHRISTMAS. 

We spent the next four days in organizing and arming 
a party of sixty discharged soldiers and citizens for the 
trip to Nicholasville. 

Early on the morning of the 14th, with muskets, twen- 
ty rounds of shot and ten day's rations, we selected from 
a lot of condemned horses such animals as we thought 
would carry us along briskly, but the roads were so bad, 
and our animals so weak, that, though we put forth our 
best effort, only succeeded in reaching Cincinnati Satur- 
day night of Chrismas eve. 

Nine month's have now elapsed. In the meantime the 
war has collapsed and the armies dissolved. 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



179 



Kim. Davis has spent his time at my brothers', and now, 
in September, 1865, goes back to see his friends in Bun- 
combe. One day, in November, he and his father rode 
together to Ashville, and on their return they met one of 
the Muse boys, who had so wickedly betrayed him and 
his comrades the Sunday we arrived in their settlement. 
Muse, recognizing Kim., shouted out: 

"Halloo, Davis ; the war has settled all things even now 
hasn't it — how are you sir?" extending his hand. 

Kim, failing to see the final adjustment, instead of ac- 
cepting the proffered hand, drew his revolver and com- 
menced firing at the rascal 3 but he escaped by jumping off 
his horse, over the fence, and running up a mountain. 

A week afterwards, Kim. was arrested upon the charge 
of assault and battery, with intent to kill. He was tried 
upon the charge and sentenced to three months imprison- 
ment in the jail, but the Governor, learning the provoca- 
tion, remitted the punishment befdfre it was all inflicted. 

Thus it is told ; and I would not wish to repeat it. 
This tedious sketch would never have been imposed upon 
the public by my own volition, had I not felt a desire to 
acknowledge, publicly, my appreciation of the services of 
the generous but humble individuals who gave it founda- 
tion. I mean the loyal Whites of North Carolina, and 
the Blacks ot South Carolina. For whatever of liberty 
we obtained, perhaps whatever of life and health we now 
enjoy, whatever of delight we may feel in the narration 
of these events, whatever of merit may be awarded for 
this accomplishment, should all be ascribed to the unre- 
quited kindness of these friends. Without their aid we 
would have been as powerless as the blind man. But the 
blacks, taking us by the hands on the banks of the Salu- 
da, led us safely through the treacherous and treasonable 
State of South Carolina, to the mountains of North Car- 
olina. There handing us over to the care of the loyal 



180 



SEVEN MONTHS A PRISONER. 



Whites^ they led us triumphantly over the rough wilds, 
to our friends in Knoxville. 

Therefore if this very unpretentious and imperfect nar- 
rative shall, even in the slightest degree, succeed in in- 
creasing the sympathy and action of the North in behalf 
of the loyal people of the South, who remained true and 
steadfast in all the trials of the war, then the labor and 
trouble it has cost, will be liberally compensated. 



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